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THE     BURIED     TEMPLE 


Bj>  the  Same  Author: 

THE  TREASURE  OF  THE  HUMBLE.  Trans- 
lated by  Alfred  Sutro.     i2mo.     $1.75. 

WISDOM  AND  DESTINY.  Translated  by 
Alfred  Sutro.     i2mo.     $1.75. 

THE  LIFE  OF  THE  BEE.  Translated  by 
Alfred  Sutro.      lamo.     $1.40  «^/. 

SISTER  BEATRICE  AND  ARDIANE  AND 
BARBE  BLEUE.  Translated  by  Bernard 
MiALL.      i2mo.     $1.20  «^/. 

THE  BURIED  TEMPLE.  Translated  by  Alfred 
Sutro.     i2mo.     %\.^onet. 

THOUGHTS  FROM  MAETERLINCK.  Arranged 
by  E.  S.  S.     i2mo.     $1.20  m^^ 

THE  DOUBLE  GARDEN.  Translated  by 
Alexander  Teixeira  de  Mattos.  i2mo. 
%\.4onet. 


The  Buried  Temple 

BY 

MAURICE   MAETERLINCK 

Translated  by 
ALFRED    SUTRO 


t 


NEW   YORK 

DODD,  MEAD   AND   COMPANY 
1910 


Copyright,  1902, 
By  Dodd,  Mead  and  Company. 

Published,  April,  1902 


CNIVUSITY    PKHS      •    JOHN  WIUON 
AND    SON      •     CAMBKIOGE,     U.  8.  A. 


^  TJNTVETl<5TTY  OF  C.^ttfornTA 

rQ  SANTA  BARJARA  COLLEGE  LIBRARY 

A4-   T^B 


THE  author's  thanks  are  due  to  Messrs. 
Chapman  and  Hall,  Messrs.  Harper  and 
Brothers,  and  the  proprietors  of  The  Independent^ 
for  their  permission  to  republish. 


Contents 

Page 

Introduction ix 

I.    The  Mystery  of  Justice   ...  3 

II.   The  Evolution  of  Mystery      .  123 

III.  The  Kingdom  of  Matter     .     .  203 

IV.  The  Past 239 

V.   Luck 269 


INTRODUCTION 

IN  this  volume  of  Essays,  M.  Maeter- 
linck manifests  that  sensitive  percep- 
tion and  remarkable  insight  as  to  the 
things  pertaining  to  the  life  of  the  spirit 
which  were  the  charm  and  power  of  "  The 
Treasure  of  the  Humble  "  and  "  Wisdom 
and  Destiny."  The  rare  and  beautiful 
philosophy  of  life,  the  Mysticism,  so 
characteristic  of  him,  alike  pervade  the 
book  and  create  an  atmosphere  of  which 
the  reader  is  conscious,  stimulating  his 
purposes  and  aspirations.  The  increased 
complexity  of  modern  human  society 
and  the  attendant  opportunities  for  the 
cultivation  of  the  intellect  result  in 
two  things :  a  greater  individual  re- 
sponsibility in  general  and  a  diminished 


Introduction 

opportunity  for  striking  and  remarkable 
individual  careers.  Hence  there  is  no 
multiplication  of  the  picturesque  hero  in 
these  days,  and,  if  he  does  appear,  the 
keen  clear  light  of  criticism  soon  shows 
that  his  heroic  trappings  are  in  large  part 
veritably  mere  tinsel.  The  world  is  fast 
coming  to  believe  and  know  that  the  real 
heroism  is  found  in  meeting  manfully  our 
daily  struggles,  trials,  and  responsibilities. 
Emerson  clearly  saw  that  now  and  in  the 
time  to  come  the  race  would  be  forced  to 
spend  most  of  its  efforts  in  the  treadmill 
of  a  work-a-day  life,  and  that  such  life, 
to  be  endurable,  must  be  recognised  not 
only  as  worthy  but  as  ideal,  having  in  it 
those  elements  which  satisfy  the  inex- 
tinguishable aspirations  after  the  truly 
heroic.  This  lesson,  learned  from  Em- 
erson, M.  Maeterlinck  has  never  forgotten, 
and  in  a  preface,  written  by  him  years 
ago,  to  a  French  translation  of  some  of 

X 


Introduction 

Emerson's  Essays,  he  says,  "  There  re- 
mains only  the  life  of  every  day,  and  yet 
we  cannot  live  without  greatness."  The 
primary  purpose  of  all  his  prose  works 
has  been  to  demonstrate  that  genuine 
heroism  can  be  infused  into  and  may 
glorify  this  life  common  to  all. 

Like  other  earnest  thinkers  of  these 
later  days,  his  is  an  attitude  of  earnest 
expectation  of  a  coming  spiritual  re- 
naissance, and  he  is  possessed  of  a  most 
refreshing  optimism.  "  A  spiritual  epoch 
is  perhaps  upon  us,"  he  has  declared ;  and 
again,  "  I  feel  that  a  more  pressing  offer  of 
spiritual  freedom  has  rarely  been  made  to 
mankind."  These  expectant  thinkers  are 
alert  to  discover  some  spiritual  truth  that 
may  become  a  basis  of  faith.  "In  the 
union  of  Mysticism  with  freedom  of 
thought  and  inquiry  will,  I  am  persuaded, 
be  found  the  faith  of  the  future,"  is  the 
prophecy  of  another  modern  seer,  and 
xi 


Introduction 

M.  Maeterlinck  has  given  us  in  the 
present  volume  a  suggestion  as  to  that 
which  may  be  the  source  of  the  spiritual 
renaissance  which  he  believes  is  at  hand. 

In  the  Essay  on  The  Mystery  of 
Justice,  he  deals  with  a  subject  more 
profound  than  any  other  that  has  hitherto 
engaged  his  attention  ;  one  vital  and  lying 
at  the  very  foundation  of  man's  moral 
nature.  It  is  not  social  justice  that  he 
has  in  mind,  but  a  far  more  subtle  and 
suggestive  phase  of  the  problem.  His 
own  words  are,  "We  shall  occupy  our- 
selves above  all  with  that  vague  but 
inevitable  justice,  intangible,  and  yet  so 
effective,  which  accompanies  and  sets  its 
seal  upon  every  action  of  our  life ;  which 
approves  or  disapproves,  rewards  or  pun- 
ishes." Justice,  which  in  the  ages  past 
mankind  have  believed  dwelt  with  God, 
by  whatever  name  known  to  them,  and 
was  manifested  in  created  nature,  he  de- 
xii 


Introduction 

clares  has  its  home  in  the  human  heart 
No  trace  of  it  can  be  discerned  elsewhere. 
He  says :  "  Where  had  man  conceived 
the  mystery  of  justice  to  lodge  ?  It 
pervaded  the  world.  One  moment  it 
was  supposed  to  rest  in  the  hands  of  the 
gods,  at  another  it  engulfed  and  mastered 
the  gods  themselves.  It  had  been  im- 
agined everywhere,  except  in  man.  It 
had  dwelt  in  the  sky,  it  had  lurked 
behind  rocks,  it  had  governed  the  air 
and  sea.  It  had  peopled  an  inaccessible 
universe.  Then  at  last  we  peered  into 
its  imaginary  retreats,  we  pressed  close 
and  examined ;  its  throne  of  clouds 
tottered,  it  faded  away ;  but  at  the  very 
moment  we  believed  it  had  ceased  to  be, 
behold  it  reappeared  and  raised  its  head 
once  more  in  the  very  depths  of  our 
heart;  and  yet  another  mystery  had 
sought  refuge  in  man,  and  embodied 
itself  in  him." 

xiii 


Introduction 

There  is  no  novelty  in  the  thought 
that  the  idea  of  justice  is  not  discernible 
in  the  laws  of  the  material  universe,  —  that 
the  processes  of  nature  are  not  moral,  but 
simply  those  of  cause  and  effect.  Per- 
chance the  life  of  a  human  being,  even 
the  span  covered  by  the  records  making 
what  is  known  as  history,  is  too  short  to 
observe  the  workings  of  the  cosmic  justice, 
or  to  determine  its  existence ;  but  that  the 
sentiment  of  justice  dwells  in  the  heart  of 
man  there  is  no  doubt.  What  concerns 
M.  Maeterlinck  is  thje  fact  that  this  in- 
stinct of  justice  is  the  great  mystery  of 
man  and  comprises  all  virtue.  "It  is  at 
the  centre  of  our  love  of  truth,  the  centre 
of  our  love  of  beauty.  It  is  kindness  and 
pity  ;  it  is  generosity,  heroism,  love."  It' 
may  be  destined  to  be  the  basis  of  a  new 
faith  which,  in  the  fulness  of  time,  shall 
have  universal  reign  upon  the  earth.  Im- 
pressively and  nobly  are  we  made  to  feel 
xiv 


Introduction 

the  reality  of  this  instinct  of  justice  and 
that  its  ultimate  triumph  is  assured ;  that 
humanity  must  hear  and  heed  "  the  in- 
ward voice  of  native  manhood,"  as  Car- 
lyle  names  it.  If  it  be  suggested  that 
here  we  have  somewhat  of  the  essential 
idea  underlying  Comte's  "  Religion  of 
Humanity  "  and  nothing  new,  it  is  to  be 
remembered  that  M.  Maeterlinck  does 
not  strive  after  the  novel,  but  rather  to 
emphasise  imperishable  truths  that  have 
been  found  ever  helpful  and  necessary. 
His  fundamental  theme,  the  Mystery 
of  Justice,  after  the  manner  of  all  mysti- 
cal teachers,  he  impresses  by  constant 
repetition  and  reiteration  through  this 
series  of  Essays,  which,  at  first  sight,  ap- 
pear to  treat  of  diverse  and  unrelated 
subjects.  His  method  is  that  of  the  or- 
ganist improvising  upon  his  theme  and 
constantly  placing  it  in  different  settings, 
and  now  and  then   merely  suggesting  it 

XV 


Introduction 

by  the  fundamental  chord  or  its  simple 
motif.  His  Mysticism  is  modern  and 
eclectic,  drawing  its  elements  from  the 
thoughts  of  the  Oriental,  Hellenic,  and 
Christian  mystics,  but  wholly  ignoring 
and  hostile  to  that  element  in  each  which 
deals  with  renunciation ;  and  this  must 
needs  be  so,  since  with  him  the  normal 
mundane  life  of  man  should  be  infused 
with  a  serene  joy,  —  must  bring  rest  of 
soul.  To  this  end,  the  burden  of  mystery 
must  be  minimised,  and  even  then  one 
must  by  intellectual  effort  subordinate  the 
sense  of  mystery  to  the  elements  in  life 
that  make  for  joyous  serenity,  that  the 
purposes  of  normal  life  may  not  be  frus- 
trated. He  says,  "We  derive  neither 
greatness,  sublimity,  nor  depth  from  un- 
ceasingly fixing  our  thoughts  on  the  in- 
finite or  unknown."  In  the  Essay  on 
The  Evolution  of  Mystery,  he  shows  that 
the  cosmic  mystery  is  probably  material 
xvi 


Introduction 

and  not  moral ;  that  the  moral  mystery  is 
in  man  alone,  and  that  relief  from  the 
incubus  of  moral  mystery  in  nature,  which 
has  oppressed  the  world  since  the  days  of 
Job,  will  afford  the  spirit  of  man  true  free- 
dom. Of  course,  modern  science,  so  far 
as  its  methods  aid  to  solve  the  problem, 
has  shown  that  the  cosmic  mystery  is  a 
material  one,  and  not  a  moral  one,  but 
M.  Maeterlinck  knows  full  well  that 
science  cannot  speak  the  ultimate  word 
on  this  subject;  that  the  truth  cannot  be 
stated  in  the  form  of  an  axiom,  nor  em- 
braced in  a  scientific  formula,  and,  as  we 
yet  "  see  through  a  glass  darkly,"  it  may 
be  that  at  heart  the  cosmic  mystery  is 
moral.  His  earnest  desire  is  to  find  the 
inspiring  truth  that  will  practically  aid 
man  in  the  development  of  the  true  life 
of  the  soul.  He  regards  affirmations, 
not  negations ;  he  is  not  disturbed  by  a 
conflict  in  his  own  thoughts ;  indeed,  his 
xvii 


Introduction 

is  the  manner  of  the  rhapsodist,  permit- 
ting us  to  follow  his  inspiration  in  all  its 
moods,  believing  that  the  light  that  guides 
him  through  the  mazes  will  be  sufficient 
to  guide  others.  Sincerity  and  an  earnest 
desire  to  find  the  truth  are  his  character- 
istics. He  is  not  a  mystic  dwelling  on  the 
inaccessible  mountain  peak,  but  sojourning 
with  his  fellows  on  the  great  plain  of  com- 
mon every-day  life.  He  bids  us  accustom 
our  eyes  to  see  into  the  clouds  of  mystery 
which  envelop  us,  that  we  may  discern 
the  dim  outlines  of  the  great  truths  there 
present  for  our  help. 

M.  Maeterlinck  writes  only  for  the 
thoughtful ;  for  those  who  see  a  purpose 
in  life  and  an  ideal  of  character  to  be 
achieved.  In  such  the  critical  faculty  is 
always  alert,  and  he  knows  that  he  may 
safely  utter  thoughts  that  have  their 
manifest  limitations,  without  spending  his 
strength  in  defining  such  limitations, 
xviii 


Introduction 

Hence  this  book  must  be  read  with  the 
critical  faculty  awake,  that  what  is  strong 
and  helpful  for  each  may  be  taken  and 
the  remainder  left. 

One  cannot  help  noting  that  this  book 
is  written  under  the  influence  of  Hellenic 
Mysticism  to  a  greater  extent  even  than 
"  Wisdom  and  Destiny."  We  look  in  vain 
here  for  such  expressions  as  are  found  in 
"  The  Treasure  of  the  Humble  "  in  pas- 
sages such  as  this  :  "  The  kisses  of  the 
silence  of  misfortune  —  and  it  is  above  all 
at  times  of  misfortune  that  silence  caresses 
us  —  can  never  be  forgotten ;  and  there- 
fore it  is  that  those  to  whom  they  have 
come  more  often  than  to  others  are 
worthier  than  those  others.  They  alone 
know,  perhaps,  how  voiceless  and  un- 
fathomable are  the  waters  on  which  the 
fragile  shell  of  daily  life  reposes;  they 
have  approached  nearer  to  God,  and  the 
steps  they  have  taken  towards  the  light 
xix 


Introduction 

are  steps  that  can  never  be  lost,  for  the 
soul  may  not  rise,  perhaps,  but  it  can 
never  sink."  Indeed,  the  emphasis  of 
Hellenic  Mysticism,  both  in  his  thought 
and  form  of  expression,  is  almost  dog- 
matic, and  herein  is  a  weakness.  A 
mystic  cannot  be,  in  any  sense,  a  dogma- 
tist; he  may  lead  us  to  his  point  of  vision 
and  bid  us  look,  and  may  tell  us  what  he 
sees  of  truth,  but  he  cannot  command  us 
to  accept  his  vision  as  ours.  Truly, 
Mysticism  can  only  be  associated  with 
freedom  of  thought,  and  hence  the  atmos- 
phere of  dogmatism  is  foreign  to  it.  Who 
can  say  that  one  honestly  and  earnestly 
looking  into  the  mystery  in  which  he 
lives  and  moves  will  not  find  there  the 
essential  truth  declared  by  Christ  as  well 
as  the  truth  discerned  by  Buddha,  Epicte- 
tus,  or  Marcus  Aurelius  ? 

EDWARD   M.    COUE. 


XX 


THE   MYSTERY   OF  JUSTICE 


The  Buried  Temple 
I 

THE    MYSTERY   OF   JUSTICE 

[I] 

I  SPEAK  for  those  who  do  not  believe 
in  the  existence  of  a  unique,  all-power- 
ful, infallible  Judge,  for  ever  intent  on  our 
thoughts,  our  feelings  and  actions,  main- 
taining justice  in  this  world,  and  com- 
pleting it  in  the  next.  And  if  there  be 
no  Judge,  what  justice  is  there  ?  None 
other  than  that  which  men  have  made  for 
themselves  by  their  laws  and  tribunals,  as 
also  in  the  social  relations  that  no  definite 
judgment  governs  ?  Is  there  nothing 
above  this  human  justice,  whose  sanction 
is  rarely  other  than  the  opinion,  the  con- 
3 


The  Buried  Temple 

fidence  or  mistrust,  the  approval  or  dis- 
approval, of  our  fellows  ?  Is  this  capable 
of  explaining  or  accounting  for  all  that 
seems  so  inexplicable  to  us  in  the  morality 
of  the  Universe,  that  we  at  times  feel 
almost  compelled  to  believe  an  intelligent 
Judge  must  exist  ?  When  we  deceive  or 
overcome  our  neighbour,  have  we  deceived 
or  overcome  all  the  forces  of  justice? 
Are  all  things  definitely  settled  then,  and 
may  we  go  boldly  on ;  or  is  there  a 
graver,  deeper  justice,  one  less  visible 
perhaps,  but  less  subject  to  error ;  one 
that  is  more  universal,  and  mightier? 

That  such  a  justice  exists  we  all  of  us 
know,  for  we  all  have  felt  its  irresistible 
power.  We  are  well  aware  that  it  covers 
the  whole  of  our  life,  and  that  at  its  centre 
there  reigns  an  intelligence  which  never 
deceives  itself,  and  which  none  can  de- 
ceive. But  where  shall  we  place  it,  now 
that  we  have  torn  it  down  from  the  skies  ? 
4 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

Where  does  it  weigh  good  and  evil,  hap- 
piness and  disaster  ?  Whence  does  it 
issue  to  deal  out  reward  and  punishment  ? 
These  are  questions  we  do  not  often  ask 
ourselves,  but  they  have  their  importance. 
The  nature  of  justice,  and  all  our  moral- 
ity, depend  on  the  answer ;  and  it  cannot 
be  fruitless,  therefore,  to  inquire  how 
that  great  idea  of  mystic  and  sovereign 
justice,  which  has  undergone  more  than 
one  transformation  since  history  began,  is 
being  received  to-day  in  the  heart  and 
mind  of  man.  And  is  this  mystery  not 
the  loftiest,  the  most  passionately  interest- 
ing, of  all  that  remain  to  us ;  does  it  not 
intertwine  with  most  of  the  others  ?  Do 
its  vacillations  not  stir  us  to  the  very 
depths  of  our  soul  ?  The  great  bulk  of 
mankind  perhaps  know  nothing  of  these 
vacillations  and  changes,  but  for  the 
evolution  of  thought  it  suffices  that  the 
eyes  of  the  few  should  see ;  and  when  the 
5 


The  Buried  Temple 

clear  consciousness  of  these  has  become 
aware  of  the  transformation,  its  influence 
will  gradually  attain  the  general  morality 
of  men. 

In  these  pages  we  shall  naturally  have 
much  to  say  of  social  justice;  in  other 
words,  of  the  justice  that  we  mutually 
extend  to  each  other  through  life ;  but  we 
shall  leave  on  one  side  legal  or  positive 
justice,  which  is  merely  the  organisation 
of  one  side  of  social  justice.  We  shall 
occupy  ourselves  above  all  with  that  vague 
but  inevitable  justice,  intangible,  and  yet 
so  effective,  which  accompanies  and  sets 
its  seal  upon  every  action  of  our  life; 
which  approves  or  disapproves,  rewards 
or  punishes.  Does  this  come  from  with- 
out? Does  an  inflexible,  undeceivable 
moral  principle  exist,  independent  of 
man,  in  the  universe  and  in  things  ?  Is 
6 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

there,  in  a  word,  a  justice  that  might  be 
called  mystic  ?  Or  does  it  issue  wholly 
from  man;  is  it  inward  even  though  it 
act  from  without ;  and  is  the  only  justice 
therefore  psychologic  P  These  two  terms, 
mystic  and  psychologic  justice,  compre- 
hend, more  or  less,  all  the  different  forms 
of  justice,  superior  to  the  social,  that 
would  appear  to  exist  to-day. 

[3] 

It  is  scarcely  conceivable  that  any  one 
who  has  forsaken  the  easy,  but  artificially 
illumined,  paths  of  positive  religion,  can 
still  believe  in  the  existence  of  a  physical 
justice  arising  from  moral  causes,  whether 
its  manifestations  assume  the  form  of 
heredity  or  disease,  of  geologic,  atmos- 
pheric, or  other  phenomena.  However 
eager  his  desire  for  illusion  or  mystery, 
this  is  a  truth  he  is  bound  to  recognise 
from  the  moment  he  begins  earnestly  and 
7 


'1  he  Buried  I'emple 

sincerely  to  study  his  own  personal  expe- 
rience, or  to  observe  the  external  ills 
which,  in  this  world  of  ours,  fall  indis- 
criminately on  good  and  wicked  alike. 
Neither  the  earth  nor  the  sky,  neither  na- 
ture nor  matter,  neither  air  nor  any  force 
known  to  man  (save  only  those  that  are 
in  him),  betrays  the  slightest  regard  for 
justice,  or  the  remotest  connection  with 
our  morality,  thoughts,  or  intentions.  Be- 
tween the  external  world  and  our  actions 
there  exist  only  the  simple  and  essentially 
non-moral  relations  of  cause  and  effect. 
If  I  am  guilty  of  a  certain  excess  or  im- 
prudence, I  incur  a  certain  danger,  and 
have  to  pay  a  corresponding  debt  to 
nature.  And  as  this  imprudence  or  ex- 
cess will  generally  have  had  an  immoral 
cause  —  or  a  cause  that  we  call  immoral 
because  we  have  been  compelled  to  regu- 
late our  life  according  to  the  requirements 
of  our  health  and  tranquillity — we  cannot 
8 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

refrain  from  establishing  a  connection  be- 
tween this  immoral  cause  and  the  danger 
to  which  we  have  been  exposed,  or  the 
debt  we  have  had  to  pay ;  and  we  are  led 
once  more  to  believe  in  the  justice  of  the 
universe,  the  prejudice  which,  of  all  those 
that  we  cling  to,  has  its  root  deepest  in  our 
heart.  And  in  our  eagerness  to  restore 
this  confidence,  we  are  content  deliberately 
to  ignore  the  fact  that  the  result  would 
have  been  exactly  the  same  had  the  cause 
of  our  excess  or  imprudence  been  —  to 
use  the  terms  of  our  infantine  vocabulary 
—  heroic  or  innocent.  If  on  an  intensely 
cold  day  I  throw  myself  into  the  water  to 
save  a  fellow-creature  from  drowning,  or 
if,  seeking  to  drown  him,  I  chance  to  fall 
in,  the  consequences  of  the  chill  will  be 
absolutely  the  same,  and  nothing  on  this 
earth  or  beneath  the  sky —  save  only  my- 
self, or  man  if  he  be  able  —  will  enhance 
my  suffering  because  I  have  committed  a 
9 


The  Buried  Temple 

crime,  or   relieve   my   pain   because   my 
action  was  virtuous. 

[4] 

Let  us  consider  another  form  of  physi- 
cal justice,  —  heredity.  There  again  we 
find  the  same  indifference  to  moral  causes. 
And  truly  it  were  a  strange  justice  indeed 
that  would  throw  upon  the  son,  and  even 
the  remote  descendant,  the  burden  of  a 
fault  committed  by  his  father  or  his 
ancestor.  But  human  morality  would 
raise  no  objection ;  man  would  not  pro- 
test. To  him  it  would  seem  natural, 
magnificent,  even  fascinating.  It  would 
indefinitely  prolong  his  individuality,  his 
consciousness  and  existence,  and  from 
this  point  of  view  would  accord  with  a 
number  of  indisputable  facts  which  prove 
that  we  are  not  wholly  self-contained, 
but  connect,  in  more  than  one  subtle, 
mysterious  fashion,  with  all  that  surrounds 
xo 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

us   in  life,  with  all  that  precedes  us,  or 
follows. 

And  yet,  true  as  this  may  be  in  certain 
cases,  it  is  not  true  as  regards  the  justice 
of  physical  heredity,  which  is  absolutely 
indifferent  to  the  moral  causes  of  the  deed 
whose  consequences  the  descendants  have 
to  bear.  There  is  physical  relation  be- 
tween the  act  of  the  father,  whereby  he 
has  undermined  his  health,  and  the  con- 
sequent suffering  of  the  son ;  but  the 
son's  suffering  will  be  the  same  whatever 
the  intentions  or  motives  of  the  father,  be 
these  heroic  or  shameful.  And,  further, 
the  area  of  what  we  call  the  justice  of 
physical  heredity  would  appear  to  be 
very  restricted.  A  father  may  have  been 
guilty  of  a  hundred  abominable  crimes ; 
he  may  have  been  a  murderer,  a  traitor,  a 
persecutor  of  the  innocent,  or  a  despoiler 
of  the  wretched,  without  these  crimes 
leaving  the  slightest  trace  upon  the  organ- 
II 


The  Buried  Temple 

ism  of  his  children.  It  is  enough  that 
he  should  have  been  careful  to  do  nothing 
that  might  injure  his  health. 

[5] 

So  much  for  the  justice  of  nature,  as 
shown  in  physical  heredity.  Moral  hered- 
ity would  appear  to  be  governed  by  similar 
principles,  but,  as  it  deals  with  modifica- 
tions of  the  mind  and  character  infinitely 
more  complex  and  elusive,  its  manifesta- 
tions are  less  striking,  and  its  results  less 
certain.  Pathology  is  the  only  region 
which  permits  of  its  definite  observation 
and  study ;  and  there  we  observe  it  to  be 
merely  the  spiritual  form  of  physical 
heredity,  which  is  its  essential  principle; 
moral  heredity  being  only  a  sequel,  and 
revealing  in  its  elementary  stage  the  same 
indiflference  to  real  justice,  and  the  same 
blindness.  Whatever  the  moral  cause  of 
the  ancestor's  drunkenness  or  debauch,  the 

Z3 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

same  punishment  may  be  meted  out  in 
mind  and  body  to  the  descendants  of  the 
drunkard  and  the  debauchee.  Intellectual 
blemish  will  almost  always  accompany 
material  blemish.  The  soul  will  be  at- 
tacked simultaneously  with  the  body : 
and  it  matters  but  little  whether  the  victim 
be  imbecile,  mad,  epileptic,  possessed  of 
criminal  instincts,  or  only  vaguely  threat- 
ened with  slight  mental  derangement :  the 
most  frightful  moral  penalty  that  a  su- 
preme justice  could  invent  has  followed 
actions  which,  as  a  rule,  cause  less  harm 
and  are  less  perverse  than  hundreds  of 
other  offences  that  nature  never  dreams 
of  punishing.  And  this  penalty,  more- 
over is  inflicted  blindly,  not  the  slightest 
heed  being  paid  to  the  motives  underly- 
ing the  actions,  motives  that  may  have 
been  excusable  perhaps,  or  Indifferent,  or 
possibly  even  admirable. 

It  would  be  absurd,  however,  to  imagine 
.13 


The  Buried  Temple 

that  drunkenness  and  debauchery  are  the 
only  agents  in  moral  heredity.  There 
are  a  thousand  others,  all  more  or  less 
unknown.  Certain  moral  qualities  appear 
to  be  transmitted  as  readily  as  though 
they  were  physical.  In  one  race,  for 
instance,  we  shall  almost  constantly  dis- 
cover certain  virtues  which  have  probably 
been  acquired.  But  who  shall  say  how 
much  is  due  to  heredity  and  how  much 
to  environment  and  example  ?  The 
problem  becomes  so  complicated,  the  facts 
so  contradictory,  that  it  is  impossible, 
amidst  the  mass  of  innumerable  causes,  to 
follow  the  track  of  one  particular  cause 
to  the  end.  Let  it  suffice  to  say  that, 
in  the  only  clear,  striking  definitive  cases 
where  an  intentional  justice  could  have 
revealed  itself  in  physical  or  moral  hered- 
ity, no  trace  of  justice  is  found.  And  if 
we  do  not  find  it  in  these,  we  are  surely 
far  less  likely  to  find  it  in  others. 
14 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

[6] 

We  may  affirm,  therefore,  that  not 
above  us,  around  us,  or  beneath  us; 
neither  in  this  life  nor  in  our  other  life 
which  is  that  of  our  children,  is  the  least 
trace  to  be  found  of  an  intentional  justice. 
But  in  the  course  of  adapting  ourselves 
to  the  laws  of  life,  we  have  naturally  been 
led  to  credit  with  our  own  moral  ideas 
those  principles  of  causality  that  we  en- 
counter most  frequently  ;  and  we  have  in 
this  fashion  created  a  very  plausible  sem- 
blance of  effective  justice,  which  rewards 
or  punishes  most  of  our  actions  in  the 
degree  that  they  approach,  or  deviate 
from,  certain  laws  that  are  essential  for 
the  preservations  of  the  race.  It  is  evi- 
dent that  if  I  sow  my  field  I  shall  have 
an  infinitely  better  prospect  of  reaping  a 
harvest  the  following  summer  than  my 
neighbour,  who  has  neglected  to  sow  his, 
'5 


The  Buried  Temple 

preferring  a  life  of  dissipation  and  idleness. 
In  this  case,  therefore,  work  obtains  its 
admirable  and  certain  reward;  and  as 
work  is  essential  for  the  preservation  of 
our  existence,  we  have  declared  it  to  be 
the  moral  act  of  all  acts,  the  first  of  all 
our  duties.  Such  instances  might  be  in- 
definitely multiplied.  If  I  bring  up  my 
children  well,  if  I  am  good  and  just  to 
those  round  about  me,  if  I  am  honest, 
active,  prudent,  wise,  and  sincere  in  all 
my  dealings,  I  shall  have  a  better  chance 
of  meeting  with  filial  piety,  with  respect 
and  aflfection,  a  better  chance  of  knowing 
moments  of  happiness,  than  the  man 
whose  actions  and  conduct  have  been  the 
very  reverse  of  mine.  Let  us  not,  how- 
ever, lose  sight  of  the  fact  that  my  neigh- 
bour, who  is,  let  us  say,  a  most  diligent 
and  thrifty  man,  might  be  prevented  by 
the  most  admirable  of  reasons,  such  as  an 
illness  caught  while  nursing  his  wife  or 
i6 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

his  friend,  from  sowing  his  ground  at  the 
proper  time,  and  that  he  also  would  reap 
no  harvest.  Mutatis  mutandisy  similar 
results  would  follow  in  the  other  instances 
I  have  mentioned.  The  cases,  however, 
are  exceptional  where  a  worthy  or  respect- 
able reason  will  hinder  the  accomplish- 
ment of  a  duty ;  and  we  shall  find,  as  a 
rule,  that  sufficient  harmony  exists  between 
cause  and  effect,  between  the  exaction  of 
the  necessary  law  and  the  result  of  the 
complying  effort,  to  enable  our  casuistry 
to  keep  alive  within  us  the  idea  of  the 
justice  of  things. 

[7] 

This  idea,  however,  deeply  ingrained 
though  it  be  in  the  hearts  and  minds  of 
the  least  credulous  and  least  mystic  of 
men,  can  surely  not  be  beneficial.  It 
reduces  our  morality  to  the  level  of  the 
insect,  which,  perched  on  a  falling  rock, 
imagines  that  the  rock  has  been  set  in 
2  17 


The  Buried  Temple 

motion  on  its  own  special  behalf.  Can 
there  be  certain  errors  and  falsehoods  that 
we  do  well  to  keep  alive  ?  There  may 
have  been  some  in  the  past  which,  for  a 
moment,  were  helpfiil;  but,  this  moment 
over,  men  found  themselves  once  again 
face  to  face  with  the  truth,  and  the  sacri- 
fice had  only  been  delayed.  Why  wait 
till  the  illusion  or  falsehood  which  ap- 
peared to  do  good  begins  to  do  actual 
harm,  or,  if  it  do  no  harm,  at  least  retards 
the  perfect  understanding  that  should 
obtain  between  the  deeply  felt  reality  and 
our  manner  of  interpreting  and  accepting 
it?  What  were  the  divine  right  of 
kings,  the  infallibility  of  the  Church,  the 
belief  in  rewards  beyond  the  grave,  but 
illusions  whose  sacrifice  reason  deferred 
too  long  ?  Nor  was  anything  gained  by 
this  dilatoriness  beyond  a  few  sterile  hopes, 
a  little  deceptive  peace,  a  few  consolations 
that  at  times  were  disastrous.  But  many 
18 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

days  had  been  lost ;  and  we  cannot  afford 
to  lose  many  days,  we  who  at  last  are 
seeking  the  truth,  and  find  in  its  search 
an  all-sufficient  reason  for  existence.  Nor 
does  anything  retard  us  more  than  the 
illusion  which,  though  torn  from  its  roots, 
we  still  permit  to  linger  among  us  ;  for 
this  will  display  the  most  extraordinary 
activity,  and  be  constantly  changing  its 
form. 

But  what  does  it  matter,  some  will  ask, 
whether  man  do  the  thing  that  is  just 
because  he  thinks  God  is  watching  — 
because  he  believes  in  a  kind  of  justice 
that  pervades  the  universe  —  or  for  the 
simple  reason  that  to  his  conscience  this 
thing  seems  just?  It  matters  above  all. 
We  have  there  three  different  men.  The 
first,  whom  God  is  watching,  will  do  much 
that  is  not  just,  for  every  God  whom  man 
has  hitherto  worshipped  has  decreed  many 
unjust  things.  And  the  second  will  not 
19 


The  Buried  Temple 

always  act  in  the  same  way  as  the  third, 
who  is,  indeed,  the  true  man  to  whom  the 
moralist  will  turn,  for  he  will  survive  both 
the  others ;  and  to  foretell  how  man  will 
conduct  himself  in  truth,  which  is  his 
natural  element,  is  more  interesting  to  the 
moralist  than  to  watch  his  behaviour  when 
enmeshed  in  falsehood. 

[8] 

It  may  seem  idle  to  those  who  do  not 
believe  in  the  existence  of  a  sovereign 
Judge  to  discuss  so  seriously  this  inadmis- 
sible idea  of  the  justice  of  things.  And 
inadmissible  it  does,  indeed,  seem  when 
presented  thus,  in  its  true  colours,  pinned 
to  the  wall  as  it  were.  This,  however,  is 
not  our  way  of  regarding  it  in  every-day 
life.  When  we  observe  how  disaster  fol- 
lows crime,  how  ruin  at  last  overtakes  ill- 
gotten  prosperity  —  when  we  witness  the 
miserable  end  of  the  debauchee,  the  short- 
ao 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

lived  triumph  of  iniquity,  it  is  our  con- 
stant habit  to  confuse  the  physical  effect 
with  the  moral  cause ;  and  however  little 
we  may  believe  in  the  existence  of  a  Judge, 
we  nearly  all  of  us  end  by  a  more  or  less 
complete  submission  to  a  strange,  vague 
faith  in  the  justice  of  things.  And  though 
our  reason,  our  calm  observation,  prove 
to  us  that  this  justice  cannot  exist,  it  is 
enough  that  an  event  should  take  place 
which  touches  us  somewhat  more  nearly, 
or  that  there  should  be  two  or  three  curi- 
ous coincidences,  for  conviction  to  fade  in 
our  heart,  if  not  in  our  mind.  Notwith- 
standing all  our  reason  and  all  our  ex- 
perience, the  merest  trifle  recalls  to  life 
within  us  the  ancestor  who  was  convinced 
that  the  stars  shone  in  their  eternal  places 
for  no  other  purpose  than  to  predict  or 
approve  a  wound  he  was  to  inflict  on  his 
enemy  upon  the  field  of  battle,  a  word  he 
should  speak  in  the  assembly  of  the  chiefs, 

31 


The  Buried  Temple 

or  an  intrigue  he  should  bring  to  a  suc- 
cessful issue  in  the  women's  quarters. 
We  of  to-day  are  no  less  inclined  to  divi- 
nise our  feelings  to  serve  our  interests ; 
the  only  difference  being  that,  the  gods 
having  no  longer  a  name,  our  methods 
have  become  less  sincere  and  less  precise. 
When  the  Greeks,  powerless  before  Troy, 
felt  the  need  of  supernatural  signal  and  sup- 
port, they  went  to  Philoctetes,  deprived 
him  of  Hercules'  bow  and  arrows,  and 
abandoned  him  ill,  naked,  and  defenceless 
on  a  desert  island.  This  was  the  mysterious 
Justice,  loftier  than  that  of  man :  this  was 
the  command  of  the  gods.  And  similarly 
do  we,  when  some  iniquity  seems  expe- 
dient to  us,  cry  loudly  that  we  do  it  for 
the  sake  of  posterity,  of  humanity,  of  the 
fatherland.  On  the  other  hand,  should 
a  great  misfortune  befall  us  we  protest 
that  there  is  no  justice,  that  there  are  no 
gods;   but  let  the  misfortune  befall    our 

33 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

enemy,  and  the  universe  is  at  once  re- 
peopled  with  invisible  Judges.  If,  how- 
ever, some  unexpected,  disproportionate 
stroke  of  good  fortune  come  to  us,  we  are 
quickly  convinced  that  we  must  possess 
merits  so  carefully  hidden  as  to  have 
escaped  our  own  observation ;  and  we 
are  happier  in  their  discovery  than  at  the 
windfall  they  have  procured  us. 

[9] 

"  One  has  to  pay  for  all  things,"  we 
say.  Yes,  in  the  depth  of  our  heart,  in 
all  that  pertains  to  man,  justice  exacts 
payment  in  the  coin  of  our  personal  hap- 
piness or  sorrow.  And  without,  in  the 
universe  that  enfolds  us,  there  is  also  a 
reckoning ;  but  here  it  is  a  different  pay- 
master who  measures  out  happiness  or 
sorrow.  Other  laws  obtain,  there  are 
other  motives,  other  methods.  It  is  no 
longer  the  justice  of  the  conscience  that 
23 


The  Buried  Temple 

presides,  but  the  logic  of  nature,  which 
cares  nothing  for  our  morality.  Within 
us  is  a  spirit  that  weighs  only  inten- 
tions, without  us  a  power  that  only 
balances  deeds.  We  try  to  persuade 
ourselves  that  these  two  work  hand  in 
hand.  But  in  reality,  though  the  spirit 
will  often  glance  towards  the  power,  this 
last  is  as  completely  ignorant  of  the 
other's  existence  as  is  the  man  weighing 
coals  in  Northern  Europe  of  the  existence 
of  his  fellow  weighing  diamonds  in  South 
Africa.  We  are  constantly  intruding  our 
sense  of  justice  into  this  non-moral  logic  ; 
and  herein  lies  the  source  of  most  of  our 
errors. 

C'o]    . 

And   further,  what   right   have  we   to 
complain  of  the  indifference  of  the  uni- 
verse, what  right  to  declare  it  incompre- 
hensible and  monstrous  ?     Why  this  sur- 
24 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

prise  at  an  injustice  in  which  we  ourselves 
have  taken  so  active  a  part  ?  It  is  true 
that  no  trace  of  justice  can  be  found  in 
disease,  accident,  or  most  of  the  hazards 
of  external  life,  which  fall  indiscrimi- 
nately on  the  good  and  the  wicked,  the 
hero  and  the  traitor,  the  poisoner  and 
the  sister  of  charity.  But  we  are  far 
too  eager  to  include  under  the  title 
**  Justice  of  the  Universe "  many  a 
flagrant  act  that  is  exclusively  human, 
and  infinitely  more  common  and  more 
destructive  than  disease,  the  hurricane, 
or  fire.  I  do  not  allude  to  war ;  it 
might  be  urged  that  we  attribute  this 
rather  to  the  will  of  the  peoples  or  kings 
than  to  nature.  But  poverty,  for  in- 
stance, which  we  still  rank  with  irre- 
mediable ills,  such  as  shipwreck  or 
plague ;  poverty,  with  all  its  crushing 
sorrows  and  transmitted  degeneration  — 
how  often  may  this  be  ascribed  to  the 
as 


The  Buried  Temple 

injustice  of  the  elements,  and  how  often 
to  the  injustice  of  our  social  condition, 
which  is  the  crowning  injustice  of  men  ? 
Need  we,  at  the  sight  of  unmerited 
wretchedness,  look  to  the  skies  for  a 
reason,  as  though  a  flash  of  lightning 
had  caused  it  ?  Need  we  seek  an  im- 
penetrable, unfathomable  Judge  ?  Is  this 
region  not  our  own ;  are  we  not  here  in 
the  best  explored,  best  known  portion 
of  our  dominion;  and  is  it  not  we  who 
organise  misery,  we  who  spread  it  abroad, 
as  arbitrarily,  from  the  moral  point  of 
view,  as  fire  and  disease  scatter  destruction 
or  suffering  ?  Is  it  reasonable  that  we 
should  wonder  at  the  sea's  indifference 
to  the  soul-state  of  its  victims,  when  we 
who  have  a  soul,  the  pre-eminent  organ 
of  justice,  pay  no  heed  whatever  to  the 
innocence  of  the  countless  thousands  whom 
we  ourselves  sacrifice,  who  are  our  own 
wretched  victims  ?  We  choose  to  regard 
26 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

as  beyond  our  control,  as  a  force  of  fatality, 
a  force  that  rests  entirely  within  our  own 
hands.  But  does  this  excuse  us  ?  Truly 
we  are  strange  lovers  of  an  ideal  justice, 
we  are  strange  judges  !  A  judicial  error 
sends  a  thrill  of  horror  from  one  end  of 
the  world  to  another ;  but  the  error  which 
condemns  three-fourths  of  mankind  to 
misery,  an  error  as  purely  human  as  that 
of  any  tribunal,  is  attributed  by  us  to 
some  inaccessible,  implacable  Power.  If 
the  child  of  some  honest  man  we  know 
be  born  blind,  imbecile,  or  deformed,  we 
will  seek  everywhere,  even  in  the  dark- 
ness of  a  religion  we  have  ceased  to 
practise,  for  some  God  whose  intention 
to  question ;  but  if  the  child  be  born 
poor  —  a  calamity  as  a  rule  no  less 
capable  than  the  gravest  infirmity  of  de- 
grading a  creature's  destiny  —  we  do  not 
dream  of  interrogating  the  God  who  is 
wherever  we  are,  since  he  is  made  of 
a? 


The  Buried  Temple 

our  own  desires.  Before  we  demand  an 
ideal  Judge  we  shall  do  well  to  purify 
our  ideas,  for  whatever  blemish  there  is 
in  these  will  surely  be  found  in  the  Judge. 
Before  we  complain  of  Nature's  indiffer- 
ence, or  ask  at  her  hand  an  equity  she 
does  not  possess,  let  us  attack  the  iniquity 
that  dwells  in  the  homes  of  men ;  and 
when  this  has  been  swept  away  we  shall 
find  that  the  part  we  assign  to  the  in- 
justice of  fate  will  be  less  by  fully  two- 
thirds.  And  the  benefit  to  mankind 
would  be  far  more  considerable  than  if 
it  lay  in  our  power  to  guide  the  storm 
or  govern  the  heat  and  the  cold,  to 
direct  the  course  of  disease  or  the  ava- 
lanche, or  contrive  that  the  sea  should 
display  an  intelligent  regard  to  our  virtues 
and  secret  intentions.  For,  indeed,  the 
poor  far  exceed  in  number  those  who  fall 
victims  to  shipwreck  or  material  accident, 
just  as  far  more  disease  is  due  to  material 

98 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

wretchedness  than  to  the  caprice  of  our 
organism,  or  the  hostility  of  the  elements. 

["] 

And  for  all  that,  we  love  justice.  We 
live,  it  is  true,  in  the  midst  of  a  great 
injustice ;  but  we  have  only  recently  ac- 
quired this  knowledge,  and  we  still  grope 
for  a  remedy.  Injustice  dates  such  a  long 
way  back ;  the  idea  of  God,  of  destiny,  of 
nature's  mysterious  decrees,  had  been  so 
closely  and  intimately  associated  with  it, 
and  is  still  so  deeply  entangled  with  most 
of  the  unjust  forces  of  the  universe,  that  it 
was  but  yesterday  that  we  commenced  the 
endeavour  to  isolate  such  elements  con- 
tained within  it  as  are  purely  human.  And 
if  we  succeed ;  if  we  can  distinguish  them, 
and  separate  them  for  all  time  from  those 
upon  which  we  are  powerless,  justice  will 
gain  more  than  by  all  that  man  has  dis- 
covered hitherto  in  his  search  for  justice. 
*9 


The  Buried  Temple 

For  indeed  in  this  social  injustice  of  ours 
it  is  not  the  human  part  that  is  capable 
of  checking  our  passion  for  equity ;  it  is 
the  part  that  a  great  number  of  men  still 
attribute  to  a  god,  to  a  kind  of  fatality, 
or  to  imaginary  laws  of  nature. 

[12] 

This  last,  inactive  part  shrinks  every 
day.  Nor  is  this  because  the  mystery  of 
justice  is  about  to  disappear.  A  mystery 
rarely  disappears  —  as  a  rule,  it  only  shifts 
its  ground.  But  it  is  often  most  important 
and  most  desirable  that  we  should  bring 
about  this  change  of  abode.  It  may  be 
said  that  two  or  three  such  changes  almost 
stand  for  the  whole  progress  of  human 
thought:  the  dislodgment  of  two  or  three 
mysteries  from  a  place  where  they  did 
harm,  and  their  transference  to  a  place 
where  they  become  inoffensive  and  capa- 
ble of  doing  good.  Sometimes  even,  there 
30 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

IS  no  need  for  the  mystery  to  change  its 
place ;  we  have  only  to  identify  it  under 
another  name.  What  was  once  called 
"the  gods,"  we  now  term  "life."  And 
if  life  be  as  inexplicable  as  were  the  gods, 
we  are  at  least  the  gainers  to  the  extent 
that  no  one  has  the  right  to  speak  or  do 
wrong  in  its  name.  The  aim  of  human 
thought  can  scarcely  be  to  destroy  mystery, 
or  lessen  it,  for  that  seems  impossible. 
We  may  be  sure  that  the  same  quantity 
of  mystery  will  ever  enwrap  the  world, 
since  it  is  the  quality  of  the  world,  as  of 
mystery,  to  be  infinite.  But  honest  human 
thought  will  seek  above  all  to  determine 
what  are  the  veritable  irreducible  myste- 
ries. It  will  endeavour  to  strip  them  of 
all  that  does  not  belong  to  them,  that  is 
not  truly  theirs,  of  the  additions  made  by 
our  errors,  our  fears,  and  our  falsehoods. 
And  as  the  artificial  mysteries  vanish,  so 
will  the  ocean  of  veritable  mystery  stretch 
31 


The  Buried  Temple 

further  and  further :  the  mystery  of  life, 
its  aim  and  its  origin ;  the  mystery  of 
thought ;  the  mystery  that  has  been  called 
"  the  primitive  accident "  or  the  "  perhaps 
unknowable  essence  of  reality." 

[■3] 

Where  had  men  conceived  the  mystery 
of  justice  to  lodge?  It  pervaded  the 
world.  At  one  moment  it  was  supposed 
to  rest  in  the  hands  of  the  gods,  at 
another  it  engulfed  and  mastered  the 
gods  themselves.  It  had  been  imagined 
everywhere  except  in  man.  It  had  dwelt 
in  the  sky,  it  had  lurked  behind  rocks,  it 
had  governed  the  air  and  the  sea,  it  had 
peopled  an  inaccessible  universe.  Then 
at  last  we  peered  into  its  imaginary  retreats, 
we  pressed  close  and  examined ;  its  throne 
of  clouds  tottered,  it  faded  away ;  but,  at 
the  very  moment  we  believed  it  had 
ceased  to  be,  behold  it  reappeared,  and 
32 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

raised  its  head  once  more  in  the  very 
depths  of  our  heart;  and  yet  another 
mystery  had  sought  refuge  in  man,  and 
embodied  itself  in  him.  For  it  is  in  our- 
selves that  the  mysteries  we  seek  to  de- 
stroy almost  invariably  find  their  last  shel- 
ter and  their  most  fitting  abode,  the  home 
which  they  had  forsaken,  in  the  wildness 
of  youth,  to  voyage  through  space  ;  and  it 
is  in  ourselves  that  we  must  learn  to  meet 
and  to  question  them.  And  truly  it  is  no 
less  wonderful,  no  less  inexplicable,  that 
man  should  have  in  his  heart  an  unchang- 
ing instinct  of  justice,  than  it  was  wonder- 
ful and  inexplicable  that  the  gods  should 
be  just,  or  the  forces  of  the  universe.  It 
is  as  difficult  to  account  for  the  essence  of 
our  memory,  our  will,  or  intelligence,  as 
it  was  to  account  for  the  memory,  will,  or 
intelligence,  of  the  invisible  powers  or 
Jaws  of  nature ;  and  if,  in  order  to  en- 
hance our  curiosity,  we  have  need  of  the 
3  33 


The  Buried  Temple 

unknown  or  unknowable ;  if,  in  order  to 
maintain  our  ardour,  we  require  mystery 
or  the  infinite,  we  shall  not  lose  a  single 
tributary  of  the  unknown  and  unknowable 
by  at  last  restoring  the  great  river  to  its 
primitive  bed ;  nor  shall  we  have  closed  a 
single  road  that  leads  to  the  infinite,  or 
lessened  by  the  minutest  fraction  the  most 
contested  of  veritable  mysteries.  Whatever 
we  take  from  the  skies  we  find  again  in 
the  heart  of  man.  But,  mystery  for  mys- 
tery, let  us  prefer  the  one  that  is  certain  to 
the  one  that  is  doubtful,  the  one  that  is 
near  to  the  one  that  is  far,  the  one  that  is 
in  us  and  of  us  to  the  harmful  one  from 
without.  Mystery  for  mystery,  let  us  no 
longer  parley  with  the  messengers,  but 
with  the  sovereign  who  sent  them  ;  no 
longer  question  those  feeble  ones  who 
silently  vanish  at  our  first  inquiry,  but 
rather  look  into  our  heart,  where  are  both 
question  and  answer  —  the  answer  which 
34 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

it  has  forgotten,  but  some  day,  perhaps, 
shall  remember. 

[14] 

Then  we  shall  be  able  to  solve  more 
than  one  disconcerting  problem  as  to  the 
distribution,  often  very  equitable,  of  re- 
ward and  punishment  among  men.  And 
by  this  we  do  not  mean  only  the  inward, 
moral  reward  and  punishment,  but  also 
the  reward  and  punishment  that  are 
visible  and  wholly  material.  There  was 
some  measure  of  reason  in  the  belief,  held 
by  mankind  from  its  very  origin,  that 
justice  penetrates,  animates  as  it  were, 
every  object  of  this  world  in  which  we 
live.  This  belief  has  not  been  explained 
away  by  the  fact  that  our  great  moral  laws 
have  been  forcibly  adapted  to  the  great 
laws  of  life  and  matter.  There  is  more 
beyond.  We  cannot  refer  all  things,  in 
all  circumstances,  to  a  simple  relation  of 
35 


The  Buried  Temple 

cause  and  effect  between  crime  and  punish- 
ment. There  is  often  a  moral  element 
also  ;  and,  though  events  have  not  placed 
it  there,  though  it  is  we  alone  who  have 
created  it,  it  is  not  the  less  powerful  and 
real.  Of  a  physical  justice,  properly  so- 
called,  we  deny  the  existence  ;  but  besides 
the  wholly  inward  psychologic  justice,  to 
which  we  shall  soon  refer,  there  is  also  a 
psychologic  justice  which  is  in  constant 
communication  with  the  physical  world  ; 
and  it  is  this  justice  that  we  attribute  to 
we  know  not  what  invisible  and  univer- 
sal principle.  And  while  it  is  wrong  to 
credit  nature  with  moral  intentions,  and 
to  allow  our  actions  to  be  governed  by 
fear  of  punishment  or  hope  of  reward 
that  she  may  reserve  for  us,  this  does 
not  imply  that,  even  materially,  there  is 
no  reward  for  good,  or  punishment  for 
evil.  Such  reward  and  punishment  un- 
doubtedly exist,  but  they  issue  not  from 
36 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

whence  we  imagine  ;  and  in  believing  that 
they  come  from  an  inaccessible  spot,  that 
they  master  us,  judge  us,  and  conse- 
quently dispense  us  from  judging  our- 
selves, we  commit  the  most  dangerous  of 
errors ;  for  none  has  a  greater  influence 
upon  our  manner  of  defending  ourselves 
against  misfortune,  or  of  setting  forth 
to  attempt  the  legitimate  conquest  of 
happiness. 

Such  justice  as  we  actually  discover  in 
nature  does  not  issue  from  her,  but  from 
ourselves,  who  have  unconsciously  placed 
it  there  by  becoming  one  with  events, 
by  animating  them,  and  adapting  them 
to  our  uses.  Accident,  disease,  lightning, 
which  strike  to  right  or  to  left,  without 
apparent  reason  or  warning,  are  not  the 
only  elements  in  our  life.  There  are 
other,  and  far  more  frequent,  cases  when 
37 


The  Buried  Temple 

we  have  direct  influence  on  the  things 
and  the  persons  around  us,  and  invest 
these  with  our  own  personality ;  cases 
where  the  forces  of  nature  become  instru- 
ments for  our  thoughts,  which,  when  un- 
just, will  make  improper  use  of  them, 
thereby  calling  forth  retaliation  and  invit- 
ing punishment  and  disaster.  But  in 
nature  there  is  no  moral  reaction ;  for 
this  emanates  from  our  own  thoughts,  or 
the  thoughts  of  other  men.  It  is  not  in 
things,  but  in  us,  that  the  justice  of  things 
resides.  It  is  our  moral  condition  that 
modifies  our  conduct  towards  the  external 
world ;  and  if  we  find  this  antagonistic,  it 
is  because  we  are  at  war  with  ourselves, 
at  war  with  the  essential  laws  of  our  mind 
and  our  heart.  The  attitude  of  nature  to* 
wards  us  is  uninfluenced  by  the  justice  or 
injustice  of  our  intentions ;  and  yet  these 
will  almost  invariably  govern  our  attitude 
towards  nature.  Here  once  more,  as  in 
3S 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

the  case  of  social  justice,  we  ascribe  to 
the  universe,  to  an  unintelligible,  eter- 
nal, fatal  principle,  a  part  that  we  play 
ourselves  ;  and  when  we  say  that  justice, 
Heaven,  nature,  or  events  are  rising  in 
revolt  against  us  to  punish  or  revenge,  it 
is  in  reality  man  who  is  using  events  to 
punish  man ;  it  is  human  nature  that  rises 
in  revolt,  and  human  justice  that  avenges. 

[i6] 

In  a  former  essay  I  referred  to  Napo- 
leon's three  crowning  acts  of  injustice : 
the  three  celebrated  crimes  that  were  so 
fatally  unjust  to  his  own  fortune.  The 
first  was  the  murder  of  the  Due  d'Enghien, 
condemned  by  order,  without  trial  or 
proof,  and  executed  in  the  trenches  of 
Vincennes,  —  an  assassination  that  sowed 
insatiable  hatred  and  vengeance  in  the 
path  of  the  guilty  dictator.  Then  the  de- 
testable intrigues  wt.ereby  he  lured  the 
39 


The  Buried  Temple 

too  trustful,  easy-going  Bourbons  to  Bay- 
onne,  that  he  might  rob  them  of  their 
hereditary  crown ;  and  the  horrible  war 
that  ensued,  a  war  that  cost  the  lives  of 
three  hundred  thousand  men,  swallowed 
up  all  the  morality  and  energy  of  the 
empire,  most  of  its  prestige,  almost  all  its 
convictions,  almost  all  the  devotion  it  in- 
spired, and  engulfed  its  prosperous  des- 
tiny. And  finally  the  frightful,  unpar- 
donable Russian  campaign,  wherein  his 
fortune  came  at  last  to  utter  shipwreck 
amid  the  ice  of  the  Berezina  and  the 
snowbound  Polish  steppes. 

"  These  prodigious  catastrophes,"  I 
said,  "  had  numberless  causes ;  but  when 
we  have  slowly  traced  our  way  through 
all  the  more  or  less  unforeseen  circum- 
stances, have  marked  the  gradual  change 
in  Napoleon's  character,  and  noted  the 
acts  of  imprudence,  folly,  and  violence 
which  this  genius  committed;  when  we 
40 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

have  seen  how  deliberately  he  brought 
disaster  to  his  smiling  fortune,  may  we 
not  almost  believe  that  what  we  behold, 
standing  erect  at  the  very  fountain-head 
of  calamity,  is  no  other  than  the  silent 
shadow  of  misunderstood  human  justice? 
Human  justice,  possessing  nothing  super- 
natural, nothing  very  mysterious ;  built 
up  of  many  thousand  very  real  little  inci- 
dents, many  thousand  falsehoods,  many 
thousand  little  offences,  of  which  each  one 
gave  rise  to  a  corresponding  act  of  retali- 
ation —  human  justice,  and  not  a  power 
that  suddenly,  at  some  tragic  moment, 
leaps  forth  like  Minerva  of  old,  fully 
armed,  from  the  formidable,  despotic  brow 
of  destiny.  In  all  this  there  is  only  one 
thing  of  mystery,  and  that  is  the  eternal 
presence  of  human  justice ;  but  we  are 
aware  that  the  nature  of  man  is  very  mys- 
terious. Let  us  in  the  meanwhile  ponder 
this  mystery.  It  is  the  most  certain  of  all, 
41 


The  Buried  Temple 

it  is  the  profoundest,  it  is  the  most  help- 
ful, it  is  the  only  one  that  will  never  par- 
alyse our  energy  for  good.  And  though 
this  patient,  vigilant  shadow  be  not  as 
clearly  defined  in  every  life  as  it  was  in 
Napoleon's,  though  justice  be  not  always 
as  active  or  as  undeniable,  we  shall  none 
the  less  do  wisely  to  study  a  case  like 
this  whenever  opportunity  offers.  It  will 
at  least  give  rise  to  doubt  within  us,  it  will 
stimulate  inquiry ;  and  these  things  are 
worth  far  more  than  the  idle,  short-sighted 
affirmation  or  denial  that  we  so  often  per- 
mit ourselves ;  for  in  all  questions  of  this 
kind  our  endeavour  should  not  be  to 
prove,  but  rather  to  arouse  attention,  to 
create  a  certain  grave,  courageous  respect 
for  all  that  yet  remains  unexplained  in  the 
actions  of  men,  in  their  subjection  to  what 
appear  to  be  general  laws,  and  in  the 
results  that  ensue." 


4S 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

[17] 

Let  us  now  try  to  discover  in  what  way 
this  great  mystery  of  justice  does  truly  and 
inevitably  work  itself  out  within  us.  The 
heart  of  him  who  has  committed  an  unjust 
act  becomes  the  scene  of  ineffaceable 
drama,  the  paramount  drama  of  human 
nature,  which  becomes  the  more  danger- 
ous, and  deadlier,  in  the  degree  of  the 
man's  greatness  and  knowledge. 

A  Napoleon  will  say  to  himself,  at  such 
troubled  moments,  that  the  morality  of  a 
great  life  cannot  be  as  simple  as  that  of  an 
ordinary  one,  and  that  an  active,  powerful 
will  has  rights  which  the  feeble  and  inert 
will  cannot  claim.  He  will  hold  that  he 
may  the  more  legitimately  sweep  aside  cer- 
tain conscientious  scruples,  inasmuch  as  it 
is  not  ignorance  or  weakness  that  causes 
him  to  disregard  these,  but  the  fact  that 
he  views  them  from  a  standpoint  higher 
43 


The  Buried  Temple 

than  that  of  most  men  ;  and  further,  that, 
his  aim  being  great  and  glorious,  this 
passing  deliberate  callousness  of  his  is 
therefore  truly  a  victory  won  by  his 
strength  and  his  intellect,  since  there  can 
be  no  danger  in  doing  wrong  when  it  is 
done  by  one  who  does  it  knowingly,  and 
has  his  very  good  reason.  All  this,  how- 
ever, does  not  for  a  moment  delude  that 
which  lies  deepest  within  us.  An  act  of 
injustice  must  always  shake  the  confidence 
a  man  had  in  himself  and  his  destiny;  at  a 
given  moment,  and  that  generally  of  the 
gravest,  he  has  ceased  to  rely  upon  himself 
alone ;  and  this  will  not  be  forgotten,  nor 
will  he  ever  again  be  wholly  himself.  He 
has  confused  and  probably  corrupted  his 
fortune  by  the  introduction  of  strange 
powers.  He  has  lost  the  exact  sense  of 
his  personality  and  of  the  force  that  is  in 
him.  He  can  no  longer  clearly  distin- 
guish between  what  is  his  own  and  comes 
44 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

from  himself,  and  what  he  is  constantly 
borrowing  from  the  pernicious  collabora- 
tors whom  his  weakness  has  summoned. 
He  has  ceased  to  be  the  general  who  has 
none  but  disciplined  soldiers  in  the  army 
of  his  thoughts ;  he  becomes  the  usurping 
chief  around  whom  are  only  accomplices. 
He  has  forsworn  the  dignity  of  the  man 
who  will  have  none  of  the  glory  at  which 
his  heart  can  only  smile  as  sadly  as  an 
ardent,  unhappy  lover  would  smile  at  a 
faithless  mistress. 

He  who  is  truly  strong  will  examine 
with  eager  care  the  praise  and  advantages 
that  his  actions  have  won  for  him;  and 
will  silently  reject  whatever  oversteps  a 
certain  line  that  he  has  drawn  in  his  con- 
sciousness. And  the  stronger  he  is,  the 
more  nearly  will  this  line  approach  the 
one  that  has  already  been  drawn  by  the 
secret  truth  that  lies  at  the  bottom  of 
all  things.  An  act  of  injustice  is  almost 
45 


The  Buried  Temple 

always  a  confession  of  weakness ;  and  very 
few  such  confessions  are  needed  to  reveal 
to  the  enemy  the  most  vulnerable  spot  of 
the  soul.  He  who  commits  an  unjust 
deed  that  he  may  gain  some  measure  of 
glory,  or  preserve  the  little  glory  he  has, 
does  but  admit  that  what  he  desires  or 
what  he  possesses  is  beyond  his  deserv- 
ing, and  that  the  part  he  has  sought  to 
play  exceeds  his  powers  of  loyal  fulfil- 
ment. And  if,  notwithstanding  all,  he 
persists  in  his  endeavour,  his  life  will 
be  soon  beset  by  falsehoods,  errors,  and 
phantoms. 

And  at  last,  after  a  few  acts  of  weak- 
ness, of  treachery,  of  culpable  self-in- 
dulgence, the  survey  of  our  past  life  can 
bring  discouragement  only,  whereas  we 
have  great  need  that  our  past  should 
inspire  and  sustain  us.  For  therein  alone 
do  we  truly  know  what  we  are ;  it  is  only 
our  past  that  can  come  to  us,  in  our 
46 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

moments  of  doubt,  and  say :  "  Since  you 
were  able  to  do  that  thing,  it  shall  lie  in 
your  power  to  do  this  thing  also.  When 
that  danger  confronted  you,  when  that 
terrible  grief  laid  you  prostrate,  you  had 
faith  in  yourself  and  you  '  conquered. 
The  conditions  to-day  are  the  same ;  do 
you  but  preserve  your  faith  in  yourself, 
and  your  star  will  be  constant."  But 
what  reply  shall  we  make  if  our  past  can 
only  whisper :  "  Your  success  has  been 
solely  due  to  injustice  and  falsehood, 
wherefore  it  behoves  you  once  more  to 
deceive  and  to  lie."  No  man  cares  to 
let  his  eyes  rest  on  his  acts  of  disloyalty, 
weakness,  or  treachery ;  and  all  the  events 
of  bygone  days  which  we  cannot  contem- 
plate calmly  and  peacefully,  with  satisfac- 
tion and  confidence,  trouble  and  restrict 
the  horizon  which  the  days  that  are  not 
yet  are  forming  far  away.  It  is  only  a 
prolonged  survey  of  the  past  that  can  give 
.     47 


The  Buried  Temple 

to  the  eye  the  strength  that  it  needs  in 
order  to  sound  the  future. 

[i8] 

No,  it  was  not  the  inherent  justice  of 
things  that  punished  Napoleon  for  his 
three  great  acts  of  injustice,  or  that  will 
punish  us  for  our  own,  in  a  less  startling, 
but  not  less  painful,  fashion.  Nor  was  it 
an  unyielding,  incorruptible,  irresistible  jus- 
tice, **  attaining  the  very  vault  of  heaven." 
We  are  punished  because  our  entire  moral 
being,  our  mind  no  less  than  our  charac- 
ter, is  incapable  of  living  and  acting  ex- 
cept in  justice.  Leaving  that,  we  leave 
our  natural  element ;  we  are  carried,  as  it 
were,  into  a  planet  of  which  we  know 
nothing,  where  the  ground  slips  from  under 
our  feet  and  all  things  disconcert  us ;  for 
while  the  humblest  intellect  feels  itself  at 
home  in  justice,  and  can  readily  foretell 
the  consequences  of  every  just  act,  the 
48 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

most  profound  and  penetrating  mind  loses 
its  way  hopelessly  in  the  injustice  itself  has 
created,  and  can  form  no  conception  of  the 
results  that  shall  ensue.  The  man  of 
genius  who  forsakes  the  equity  that  the 
humblest  peasant  has  at  heart  will  find  all 
paths  strange  to  him ;  and  these  will  be 
stranger  still  should  he  overstep  the  limit 
his  own  sense  of  justice  imposes ;  for  the 
justice  that  soars  aloft,  keeping  pace  with 
the  intellect,  creates  new  boundaries  around 
all  it  throws  open,  while  at  the  same  time 
strengthening  and  rendering  more  insur- 
mountable still  the  ancient  barriers  of 
instinct.  The  moment  we  cross  the  prim- 
itive frontier  of  equity  all  things  seem  to 
fail  us  ;  one  falsehood  gives  birth  to  a  hun- 
dred, and  treachery  returns  to  us  through 
a  thousand  channels.  If  justice  be  in  us  we 
may  march  along  boldly,  for  there  are  cer- 
tain things  to  which  the  basest  cannot  be 
false;  but  if  injustice  possess  us  we  must 
4  49 


The  Buried  Temple 

beware  of  the  justest  of  men,  for  there 
are  things  to  which  even  these  cannot  re- 
main faithful.  As  our  physical  organism 
was  devised  for  existence  in  the  atmos- 
phere of  our  globe,  so  is  our  moral  organ- 
ism devised  for  existence  in  justice.  E  very- 
faculty  craves  for  it,  is  more  intimately 
bound  up  with  it  than  with  the  laws  of 
gravitation,  of  light  or  heat ;  and  to  throw 
ourselves  into  injustice  is  to  plunge  head- 
long into  the  hostile  and  the  unknown. 
All  that  is  in  us  has  been  placed  there 
with  a  view  to  justice ;  all  things  tend 
thither  and  urge  us  towards  it ;  whereas 
when  we  harbour  injustice  we  battle  against 
our  own  strength ;  and  at  last,  at  the  hour 
of  inevitable  punishment,  when,  prostrate, 
weeping,  and  penitent,  we  recognise  that 
events,  the  sky,  the  universe,  the  invisi- 
ble, are  all  in  rebellion,  all  justly  in  league 
against  us,  then  may  we  truly  say,  not 
that  these  are,  or  ever  have  been,  just, 
50 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

but  that  we,  notwithstanding  ourselves, 
have  contrived  to  remain  just  even  in 
injustice. 

[■9] 

We  affirm  that  nature  is  absolutely 
indifferent  to  our  morality,  and  that  were 
this  morality  to  command  us  to  kill  our 
neighbour,  or  to  do  him  the  utmost  pos- 
sible harm,  nature  would  aid  us  in  this  no 
less  than  in  our  endeavour  to  comfort  or 
serve  him.  She  would  as  often  seem  to 
reward  us  for  having  made  him  suffer  as 
for  our  kindness  towards  him.  Are  we 
entitled  to  conclude  from  this  that  nature 
has  no  morality  —  using  the  word  in  its 
most  limited  sense  as  meaning  the  logical, 
inevitable  subordination  of  the  means  to 
the  accomplishment  of  a  general  mission  ? 
That  is  a  question  to  which  we  must  not 
too  hastily  reply.  We  know  nothing  of 
nature's  aim,  or  whether  she  have  an  aim. 
'  51 


The  Buried  Temple 

We  know  nothing  of  her  consciousness, 
or  whether  she  have  a  consciousness ;  of 
her  thoughts,  or  whether  she  think  at  all. 
It  is  with  her  deeds  and  her  manner  of 
doing  that  we  are  solely  concerned.  And 
in  these  we  find  the  same  contraxiiction 
between  our  morality  and  nature's  mode 
of  action  as  exists  between  our  conscious- 
ness and  the  instincts  that  nature  has 
planted  within  us.  For  this  conscious- 
ness, though  in  ultimate  analysis  due  to 
her  also,  has  nevertheless  been  formed 
by  ourselves,  and  basing  itself  upon  the 
loftiest  human  morality,  offers  an  ever 
stronger  opposition  to  the  desires  of  in- 
stinct. Were  we  to  listen  only  to  these 
last,  we  should  act  in  all  things  like 
nature,  which  would  always  seem  to  justify 
the  triumph  of  the  stronger,  the  victory 
of  the  least  scrupulous  and  best  equipped, 
and  this  in  the  midst  of  the  most  inexcus- 
able wars,  the  most  flagrant  acts  of  in- 
52 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

justice  or  cruelty.  Our  one  object  would 
be  our  own  personal  triumph ;  nor  should 
we  pay  the  least  heed  to  the  rights  or 
sufferings  of  our  victims,  to  their  inno- 
cence or  beauty,  moral  or  intellectual 
superiority.  But,  in  that  case,  why  has 
nature  placed  within  us  a  consciousness 
and  a  sense  of  justice  that  have  pre- 
vented us  from  desiring  the  things  that  she 
desires  ?  Or  is  it  we  ourselves  who  have 
placed  them  there  ?  Are  we  capable  of 
deriving  from  within  us  something  that  is 
not  in  nature ;  are  we  capable  of  giving 
abnormal  development  to  a  force  that 
opposes  her  force ;  and  if  we  possess 
this  power,  must  she  not  have  reasons  of 
her  own  for  permitting  us  to  possess  it? 
Why  should  there  be  only  in  us,  and 
nowhere  else  in  the  world,  these  two  irrec- 
oncilable tendencies  that  in  every  man 
are  incessantly  at  strife,  and  victorious  in 
turn?  Would  one  have  been  dangerous 
S3 


The  Buried  Temple 

without  the  other  ?  Would  it  have  over- 
stepped its  goal,  perhaps ;  would  the  de- 
sire for  conquest,  unchecked  by  the  sense 
of  justice,  have  led  us  to  annihilation,  as 
the  sense  of  justice  without  the  desire  for 
conquest  might  have  induced  inertia? 
But  which  of  these  two  tendencies  is  the 
more  natural  and  necessary,  which  is  the 
narrower  and  which  the  vaster,  which  is 
provisional  and  which  eternal  ?  Where 
shall  we  learn  which  one  we  should  combat 
and  which  one  encourage  ?  Ought  we  to 
conform  to  the  law  that  is  incontestably 
the  more  general,  or  should  we  cherish  in 
our  heart  a  law  that  is  evidently  excep- 
tional ?  Are  there  circumstances  under 
which  we  have  the  right  to  go  forth  in 
search  of  the  apparent  ideal  of  life  ?  Is 
it  our  duty  to  follow  the  morality  of  the 
species  or  race,  which  seems  irresistible  to 
us,  being  one  of  the  visible  sides  of  nature's 
obscure  and  unknown  intentions ;  or  is  it 
54 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

essential  that  the  individual  should  main- 
tain and  develop  within  him  a  morality 
entirely  opposed  to  that  of  the  race  or 
species  whereof  he  forms  part  ? 

[20] 

The  truth  is  that  the  question  which  con- 
fronts us  here  is  only  another  form  of  the 
one  which  lies  at  the  root  of  evolutionary 
morality,  and  is  probably  scientifically  un- 
solvable.  Evolutionary  morality  bases  it- 
self on  the  justice  of  nature  —  though  it 
dare  not  speak  out  the  word ;  on  the 
justice  of  nature,  which  imposes  upon 
each  individual  the  good  or  evil  conse- 
quences of  his  own  character  and  his  own 
actions.  But  when,  on  the  other  hand,  it 
is  necessary  for  evolutionary  morality  to 
justify  actions  which,  although  intrinsi- 
cally unjust,  are  necessary  for  the  prosper- 
ity of  the  species,  it  falls  back  upon  what 
55 


The  Buried  Temple 

it  reluctantly  terms  nature's  indifference 
or  injustice.  Here  we  have  two  unknown 
aims,  that  of  humanity  and  that  of  man- 
kind ;  and  these,  wrapped  as  they  are  in  a 
mystery  that  may  some  day  perhaps  pass 
away,  would  seem  to  be  irreconcilable  in 
our  mind.  Essentially,  all  these  questions 
resolve  themselves  into  one,  which  is  of 
the  utmost  importance  to  our  contempo- 
rary morality.  The  race  would  appear  to 
be  becoming  conscious,  prematurely  it 
may  be,  and  perhaps  disastrously,  not,  we 
will  say,  of  its  rights,  for  that  problem  is 
still  in  suspense,  but  of  the  fact  that 
morality  does  not  enter  into  certain  actions 
that  go  to  make  history. 

This  disquieting  consciousness  would 
seem  to  be  slowly  invading  our  individual 
life.  Thrice,  and  more  or  less  in  the 
course  of  one  year,  has  this  question  con- 
fronted us,  and  assumed  vast  proportions : 
in  the  matter  of  America's  crushing  defeat 
56 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

of  Spain  (although  here  the  issues  are 
confused,  for  the  Spaniards  had  been  guilty 
of  so  many  acts  of  injustice  in  the  past, 
besides  their  present  blunders,  that  the 
problem  becomes  very  involved) ;  in  the 
case  of  an  innocent  man  sacrificed  to 
the  preponderating  interest  of  his  coun- 
try ;  and  in  the  iniquitous  war  of  the 
Transvaal.  It  is  true  that  the  phenome- 
non is  not  altogether  without  precedent. 
Man  has  always  endeavoured  to  justify 
his  injustice;  and  when  human  justice 
offered  him  no  excuse  or  pretext,  he  found 
in  the  will  of  the  gods  a  law  superior  to 
the  justice  of  man.  But  our  excuse  or 
pretext  of  to-day  is  fraught  with  the  more 
peril  to  our  morality  inasmuch  as  it  re- 
poses on  a  law,  or  at  least  a  habit,  of 
nature,  that  is  far  more  real,  more  incon- 
testable and  universal  than  the  will  of  an 
ephemeral  and  local  god. 

Which  shall  prevail  in  the  end,  justice 
57 


The  Buried  Temple 

or  force  ?  Does  force  contain  an  unknown 
justice  that  will  absorb  our  human  justice, 
or  is  the  impulse  of  justice  within  us,  that 
would  seem  to  resist  blind  force,  actually 
no  more  than  a  devious  emanation  from 
that  force,  tending  to  the  same  end ;  and 
is  it  only  the  point  of  deviation  that  escapes 
us  ?  This  is  not  a  question  that  we  can 
answer,  we  who  ourselves  form  part  of 
the  mystery  we  seek  to  solve ;  the  reply 
could  come  only  from  one  who  might 
be  gazing  upon  us  from  the  heights  of 
another  world :  one  who  should  have 
learned  the  aim  of  the  universe  and  the 
destiny  of  man.  In  the  meanwhile,  if 
we  say  that  nature  is  right,  we  say  that  the 
instinct  of  justice,  which  she  has  placed  in 
us,  and  which  therefore  also  is  nature,  is 
wrong ;  whereas  if  we  approve  this  in- 
stinct, our  approval  is  necessarily  derived 
from  the  exercise  of  the  very  faculty  that 
is  called  in  question. 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

[21] 

That  is  true ;  but  it  is  no  less  true  that 
the  endeavour  to  sum  up  the  world  in 
a  syllogism  is  one  of  the  oldest  and  vain- 
est habits  of  man.  In  the  region  of  the 
unknown  and  unknowable,  logic-chopping 
has  its  perils  ;  and  here  all  our  doubts 
would  seem  to  arise  from  another  hazard- 
ous syllogism.  We  tell  ourselves  — 
boldly  at  times,  but  more  often  in  a  whis- 
per —  that  we  are  nature's  children,  and 
bound  therefore  in  all  things  to  conform 
to  her  laws  and  copy  her  example.  And 
since  nature  regards  justice  with  indiffer- 
ence, since  she  has  another  aim,  which  is 
the  sustaining,  the  renewing,  the  incessant 
development,  of  life,  it  follows  ...  So 
far  we  have  not  formulated  the  conclusion, 
or,  at  least,  this  conclusion  has  not  yet 
dared  openly  to  force  its  way  into  our 
morality  ;  but,  although  its  influence  has 
59 


The  Buried  Temple 

hitherto  only  been  remotely  felt  in  that 
familiar  sphere  which  includes  our  relations, 
our  friends,  and  our  immediate  surround- 
ings, it  is  slowly  penetrating  into  the  vast 
and  desolate  region  whither  we  relegate  all 
those  whom  we  know  not  and  see  not, 
who  for  us  have  no  name.  It  is  already 
to  be  found  at  the  root  of  many  of  our 
actions ;  it  has  entered  our  politics,  our 
industry,  our  commerce  ;  indeed  it  affects 
almost  all  we  do  from  the  moment  we 
emerge  from  the  narrow  circle  of  our 
domestic  hearth,  the  only  place  for  the 
majority  of  men  where  a  little  veritable 
justice  is  still  to  be  found,  a  little  benevo- 
lence, a  little  love.  It  will  call  itself  eco- 
nomic or  social  law,  evolution,  competition, 
struggle  for  life ;  it  will  masquerade  under 
a  thousand  names,  forever  perpetrating 
the  selfsame  wrong.  And  yet  nothing 
can  be  less  legitimate  than  such  a  conclu- 
sion. Apart  from  the  fact  that  we  might 
60 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

with  equal  justification  reverse  the  syllo- 
gism, and  cause  it  to  declare  that  there 
must  be  a  certain  justice  in  nature,  since 
we,  her  children,  are  just,  we  need  only 
consider  it  as  it  stands  to  realise  how  doubt- 
ful and  contestable  is  at  least  one  of  its  two 
premisses. 

We  have  seen  in  the  preceding  chapters 
that  nature  does  not  appear  to  be  just  from 
our  point  of  view  ;  but  we  have  absolutely 
no  means  of  judging  whether  she  be  not 
just  from  her  own.  The  fact  that  she 
pays  no  heed  to  the  morality  of  our  actions 
does  not  warrant  the  inference  that  she  has 
no  morality,  or  that  ours  is  the  only  one 
there  can  be.  We  are  entitled  to  say  that 
she  cares  not  whether  our  intentions  be 
good  or  evil,  but  we  have  not  the  right 
to  conclude  that  she  has  therefore  no 
morality  and  no  equity  ;  for  that  would  be 
tantamount  to  affirming  that  there  are  no 
more  mysteries  or  secrets,  and  that  we 
6i 


The  Buried  Temple 

know  all  the  laws  of  the  universe,  its  origin 
and  its  end.  Her  mode  of  action  is 
different  from  our  own,  but,  I  say  it  once 
more,  we  know  not  what  her  reason  may 
be  for  acting  in  this  different  fashion ;  and 
we  have  no  right  to  imitate  what  seems 
iniquitous  and  cruel  to  us  so  long  as  we 
have  no  precise  knowledge  of  the  pro- 
found and  salutary  reasons  that  may  un- 
derlie such  action.  What  is  the  aim  of 
nature?  Whither  do  the  worlds  tend 
that  stretch  across  eternity  ?  Where  does 
consciousness  begin,  and  is  its  only  form 
that  which  it  assumes  in  ourselves  ?  At 
what  point  do  physical  laws  become  moral 
laws  ?  Is  life  unintelligent  ?  Have  we 
sounded  all  the  depths  of  nature,  and  is  it 
only  in  our  cerebro-spinal  system  that  she 
becomes  mind  ?  And  finally,  what  is  jus- 
tice when  viewed  from  other  heights  ?  Is 
the  intention  necessarily  at  its  centre  ;  and 
can  no  regions  exist  where  intentions  no 

63 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

longer  shall  count  ?  We  should  have  to 
answer  these  questions,  and  many  others, 
before  we  should  be  able  to  tell  whether 
nature  be  just  or  unjust  from  the  point 
of  view  of  masses  whose  vastness  corres- 
ponds to  her  own.  She  disposes  of  a 
future,  a  space,  of  which  we  can  form  no  con- 
ception ;  and  in  these  there  exists,  it  may 
be,  a  justice  proportioned  to  her  duration, 
her  extent  and  her  aim,  even  as  our  own 
instinct  of  justice  is  proportioned  to  the 
duration  and  narrow  circle  of  our  own  life. 
The  wrong  that  she  may  for  centuries  com- 
mit she  has  centuries  in  which  to  repair ; 
but  we  who  have  only  a  few  days  before  us, 
what  right  have  we  to  imitate  what  our 
eye  cannot  see,  understand  or  follow  ? 
By  what  standard  are  we  to  judge  her, 
if  we  look  away  from  the  passing  hour  ? 
For  instance,  considering  only  the  imper- 
ceptible speck  that  we  form  in  the  worlds, 
and  disregarding  the  immensity  that  sur- 
63 


The  Buried  Temple 

rounds  us,  we  are  wholly  ignorant  of  all 
that  concerns  our  possible  life  beyond  the 
tomb ;  and  we  forget  that,  in  the  present 
state  of  our  knowledge,  nothing  authorises 
us  to  affirm  that  there  may  not  be  a  kind 
of  more  or  less  conscious,  more  or  less 
responsible,  after-life,  that  shall  in  no  way 
depend  on  the  decisions  of  an  external 
will.  He  would  indeed  be  rash  who 
should  venture  to  affirm  that  nothing 
survives,  either  in  us  or  in  others,  of  the 
effiarts  of  our  good  intentions  and  the 
acquirements  of  our  mind.  It  may  be  — 
and  serious  experiments,  though  they  do 
not  seem  to  prove  the  phenomenon,  may 
still  allow  us  to  class  it  among  scientific 
possibilities  —  it  may  be  that  a  part  of  our 
personality,  of  our  nervous  force,  may 
escape  dissolution.  How  vast  a  future 
would  then  be  thrown  open  to  the  laws 
that  unite  cause  to  effect,  and  that  always 
end  by  creating  justice  when  they  come 
64 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

into  contact  with  the  human  soul,  and 
have  centuries  before  them  !  Let  us  not 
forget  that  nature  at  least  is  logical,  even 
though  we  call  her  unjust ;  and  were  we 
to  resolve  on  injustice,  our  difficulty  would 
be  that  we  must  also  be  logical ;  and 
when  logic  comes  into  touch  with  our 
thoughts  and  our  feelings,  our  intentions 
and  passions,  what  is  there  that  differen- 
tiates it  from  justice  ? 

["] 

Let  us  form  no  too  hasty  conclusion ; 
too  many  points  are  still  uncertain.  Should 
we  seek  to  imitate  what  we  term  the  in- 
justice of  nature,  we  would  run  the  risk 
of  imitating  and  fostering  only  the  in- 
justice that  is  in  ourselves.  When  we 
say  that  nature  is  unjust,  we  are  in  effect 
complaining  of  her  indifference  to  our 
own  little  virtues,  our  own  little  intentions, 
our  own  little  deeds  of  heroism ;  and 
S  65 


The  Buried  Temple 

it  is  our  vanity  far  more  than  our  sense 
of  equity  that  considers  itself  aggrieved. 
Our  morality  is  proportionate  to  our 
stature  and  our  restricted  destiny;  nor 
have  we  the  right  to  forsake  it  because  it 
is  not  on  the  scale  of  the  immensity  and 
infinite  destiny  of  the  universe. 

And  further,  should  it  even  be  proved 
that  nature  is  unjust  at  all  points,  the 
other  question  remains  intact:  whether 
the  command  be  laid  upon  man  to  follow 
nature  in  her  injustice.  Here  we  shall 
do  well  to  let  our  own  consciousness 
speak,  rather  than  listen  to  a  voice  so 
formidable  that  we  hear  not  a  word  it 
utters,  and  know  not  even  whether  words 
there  be.  Reason  and  instinct  tell  us 
that  it  is  right  to  follow  the  counsels  of 
nature;  but  they  tell  us  also  that  we 
should  not  follow  those  counsels  when 
they  clash  with  another  instinct  within 
us,  one  that  is  no  less  profound:  the 
66 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

instinct  of  the  just  and  the  unjust.  And 
if  instincts  do  indeed  draw  very  near  to 
the  truth  of  nature,  and  must  be  respected 
by  us  in  the  degree  of  the  force  that  is  in 
them,  this  one  is  perhaps  the  strongest 
of  all,  for  it  has  struggled  alone  against 
all  the  others  combined,  and  still  persists 
within  us.  Nor  is  this  the  hour  to  reject 
it.  Until  other  certitudes  reach  us,  it 
behoves  us,  who  are  men,  to  continue 
just  in  the  human  way  and  the  human 
sphere.  We  do  not  see  far  enough,  or 
clearly  enough,  to  be  just  in  another 
sphere.  Let  us  not  venture  into  a  kind 
of  abyss,  out  of  which  races  and  peoples 
to  come  may  perhaps  find  a  passage ;  but 
whereinto  man,  in  so  far  as  he  is  man, 
must  not  seek  to  penetrate.  The  injustice 
of  nature  ends  by  becoming  justice  for  the 
race;  she  has  time  before  her,  she  can 
wait,  her  injustice  is  of  her  girth.  But 
for  us  it  is  too  overwhelming,  and  our 
67 


The  Buried  Temple 

days  are  too  few.  Let  us  be  satisfied  that 
force  should  reign  in  the  universe,  but 
equity  in  our  heart.  Though  the  race  be 
irresistibly,  and  perhaps  justly,  unjust, 
though  even  the  crowd  appear  possessed 
of  rights  denied  to  the  isolated  man,  and 
commit  on  occasions  great,  inevitable,  and 
salutary  crimes,  it  is  still  the  duty  of  each 
individual  of  the  race,  of  every  member 
of  the  crowd,  to  remain  just,  while  ever 
adding  to,  and  sustaining,  the  conscious- 
ness within  him.  Nor  shall  we  be  entitled 
to  abandon  this  duty  till  all  the  reasons 
of  the  great  apparent  injustice  be  known 
to  us ;  and  those  that  are  given  us  now, 
preservation  of  the  species,  reproduction, 
and  selection  of  the  strongest,  ablest, 
"  fittest,"  are  not  sufficient  to  warrant  so 
frightful  a  change.  Let  each  one  try  by 
all  means  to  become  the  strongest,  most 
skilful,  the  best  adapted  to  the  necessities 
of  the  life  that  he  cannot  transform ;  but, 
68 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

so  far,  the  qualities  that  shall  enable  him 
to  conquer,  that  shall  give  the  fullest  play 
to  his  moral  power  and  his  intelligence, 
and  shall  truly  make  him  the  happiest, 
most  skilful,  the  strongest  and  "fittest" 
—  these  qualities  are  precisely  the  ones 
that  are  the  most  human,  the  most  honour- 
able and  the  most  just. 

"  Within  me  there  is  more,"  runs  the 
fine  device  inscribed  on  the  beams  and 
pediment  of  an  old  patrician  mansion  at 
Bruges,  which  every  traveller  visits ;  fill- 
ing a  corner  of  one  of  those  tender  and 
melancholy  quays,  that  are  as  forlorn  and 
lifeless  as  though  they  existed  only  on 
canvas.  And  so  too  might  man  exclaim, 
"  Within  me  there  is  more ; "  every  law 
of  morality,  every  intelligible  mystery. 
There  may  be  many  others,  above  and 
below  us ;  but  if  these  are  to  remain  for- 
69 


The  Buried  Temple 

ever  unknown,  they  become  for  us  as 
though  they  existed  not ;  and  should  their 
existence  one  day  be  revealed  to  us,  it 
can  only  be  because  they  already  are  in 
us,  already  are  ours.  "  Within  me  there 
is  more ;  "  and  we  are  entitled  to  add,  per- 
haps : "  I  have  nothing  to  fear  from  that 
which  is  in  me." 

This  much  at  least  is  certain :  that  the 
one  active,  inhabited  region  of  the  mystery 
of  justice  is  to  be  found  within  ourselves. 
Other  regions  lack  consistency  ;  they  are 
probably  imaginary,  and  must  inevitably 
be  deserted  and  sterile.  They  may  have 
furnished  mankind  with  illusions  that 
served  some  purpose,  but  not  always 
without  domg  harm  ;  and  though  we  may 
scarcely  be  entitled  to  demand  that  all 
illusions  should  be  destroyed,  they  should 
at  least  not  be  too  manifestly  opposed  to 
our  conception  of  the  universe.  To-day 
we  seek  in  all  things  the  illusion  of  truth. 
70 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

It  is  not  the  last,  perhaps,  or  the  best,  or 
the  only  one  possible ;  but  it  is  the  one 
which  we  at  present  regard  as  the  most 
honourable  and  the  most  necessary.  Let 
us  limit  ourselves  therefore  to  recognising 
the  admirable  love  of  justice  and  truth 
that  exists  in  the  heart  of  man.  Proceed- 
ing thus,  yielding  admiration  only  where 
it  is  incontestably  due,  we  shall  gradually 
acquire  some  knowledge  of  this  passion, 
which  is  the  distinguishing  mark  of  man ; 
and  one  thing,  most  important  of  all,  we 
shall  most  undoubtedly  learn  —  the  means 
whereby  we  can  purify  it,  and  still  further 
increase  it.  As  we  observe  its  incessant 
activity  in  the  depths  of  our  heart,  the 
only  temple  where  it  can  truly  be  active ; 
as  we  watch  it  blending  with  all  that  we 
think,  and  feel,  and  do,  we  shall  quickly 
discover  which  are  the  things  that  throw 
light  upon  it,  and  which  those  that  plunge 
it  in  darkness,  which  are  the  things  that 
71 


The  Buried  Temple 

guide  it  and  which  those  that  lead  it  astray; 
we  shall  learn  what  nourishes  and  what 
atrophies,  what  attacks  and  what  defends. 
Is  justice  no  more  than  the  human  in- 
stinct of  preservation  and  defence  ?  Is 
it  the  purest  product  of  our  reason ;  or 
rather  to  be  regarded  as  composed  of  a 
number  of  those  sentimental  forces  which 
so  often  are  right,  though  directly  op- 
posed to  our  reason  —  forces  that  in  them- 
selves are  a  kind  of.  unconscious,  vaster 
reason,  to  which  our  conscious  reason 
invariably  accords  its  startled  approval 
when  it  has  reached  the  heights  whence 
those  kindly  feelings  long  had  beheld 
what  itself  was  unable  to  see?  Is  justice 
dependent  on  intellect,  or  rather  on  char- 
acter? Questions  these  that  are  perhaps 
not  idle  if  we  indeed  would  seek  to  know 
what  steps  we  must  take  to  invest  with 
all  its  radiance  and  all  its  power  the  love 
of  justice  that  is  the  central  jewel  of  the 
72 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

human  soul.  All  men  love  justice,  but 
not  with  the  same  ardent,  fierce,  exclusive 
love ;  nor  have  they  all  the  same  scruples, 
the  same  sensitiveness,  or  the  same  deep 
conviction.  We  meet  people  of  highly 
developed  intellect,  in  whom  the  sense  of 
what  is  just  and  unjust  is  yet  infinitely 
less  delicate,  less  clearly  marked,  than  in 
others  whose  intellect  would  seem  to  be 
mediocre ;  for  here  a  great  part  is  played 
by  that  little  known,  ill-defined  side  of 
ourselves  that  we  term  the  character. 
And  yet  it  is  difficult  to  tell  how  much 
more  or  less  unconscious  intellect  must 
of  necessity  go  with  the  character  that  is 
unaffectedly  honest.  The  point  before  us, 
however,  is  to  learn  how  best  to  illumine, 
and  increase  within  us,  our  desire  for  jus- 
tice ;  and  it  is  certain  that,  at  the  start, 
our  character  is  less  directly  influenced  by 
our  desire  for  justice  than  is  our  intellect, 
the  development  of  which  this  desire 
73 


The  Buried  Temple 

in  a  large  measure  controls ;  and  the  co- 
operation of  the  Intellect,  which  recog- 
nises and  encourages  our  good  intention, 
is  necessary  for  this  to  penetrate  into,  and 
mould,  our  character.  That  portion  of 
our  love  of  justice,  therefore,  which  de- 
pends on  our  character,  will  benefit  by  its 
passage  through  the  intellect ;  for  in  pro- 
portion as  the  intellect  rises,  and  acquires 
enlightenment,  will  it  succeed  in  master- 
ing, enlightening,  and  transforming  our 
instincts  and  our  feelings. 

But  let  us  no  longer  believe  that  this 
love  must  be  sought  in  a  kind  of  su- 
perhuman, and  often  inhuman,  infinite. 
None  of  the  grandeur  and  beauty  that 
this  infinite  may  possess  would  fall  to  its 
portion  ;  it  would  only  be  incoherent,  in- 
active, and  vague.  Whereas  by  seeking 
it  in  ourselves,  where  it  truly  is ;  by  ob- 
serving it  there,  listening  to  it,  marking 
how  it  profits  by  every  acquirement  of 
74 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

our  mind,  every  joy  and  sorrow  of  our 
heart,  we  soon  shall  learn  what  we  best 
had  do  to  purify  and  increase  it. 

[24] 

Our  task  within  these  limits  will  be 
sufficiently  long  and  mysterious.  To 
increase  and  purify  within  us  the  desire 
for  justice  :  how  shall  this  thing  be  done  ? 
We  have  some  vague  conception  of  the 
ideal  that  we  would  approach  ;  but  how 
changeable  still,  and  illusory,  is  this  ideal ! 
It  is  lessened  by  all  that  is  still  unknown 
to  us  in  the  universe,  by  all  that  we  do 
not  perceive,  or  perceive  incompletely,  by 
all  that  we  question  too  superficially.  It 
is  hedged  round  by  the  most  insidious 
dangers  ;  it  falls  victim  to  the  strangest 
oblivion,  the  most  inconceivable  blunders. 
Of  all  our  ideals  it  is  the  one  that  we 
should  watch  with  the  greatest  care  and 
anxiety,  with  the  most  passionate,  pious 
75 


The  Buried  Temple 

eagerness  and  solicitude.  What  seems 
irreproachably  just  to  us  at  the  moment 
is  probably  the  merest  fraction  of  what 
would  seem  just,  could  we  regard  it  from 
another  place.  We  need  only  compare 
what  we  were  doing  yesterday  with  what 
we  do  to-day  ;  and  what  we  do  to-day 
would  appear  full  of  faults  against  equity 
were  it  granted  to  us  to  rise  still  higher 
and  compare  it  with  what  we  shall  do  to- 
morrow. There  needs  but  a  passing 
event,  a  thought  that  rises,  a  duty  to 
ourselves  that  takes  definite  form,  an  un- 
expected responsibility  that  is  suddenly 
made  clear,  for  the  whole  organisation  of 
our  inward  justice  to  totter  and  be  trans- 
formed. Slow  as  our  advance  may  have 
been,  we  still  should  find  it  impossible  to 
begin  life  again  in  the  midst  of  many  a 
sorrow  whereof  we  were  the  involuntary 
cause,  many  a  discouragement  to  which 
we  unconsciously  gave  rise ;  and  yet, 
76 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

when  these  things  came  into  being  around 
us,  we  appeared  to  be  in  the  right,  and 
did  not  consider  ourselves  unjust.  And 
even  so  are  we  convinced  to-day  of  our 
excellent  intentions  ;  even  so  do  we  tell 
ourselves  that  we  are  the  cause  of  no 
suffering  and  no  tears,  that  we  stay  not  a 
murmur  of  happiness,  shorten  no  moment 
of  peace  or  of  love ;  and  it  may  be  that 
there  passes,  unperceived  of  us,  to  our 
right  or  our  left,  an  illimitable  injustice 
that  spreads  over  three  fourths  of  our  life. 

I  chanced  to-day  to  take  up  a  copy 
of  the  "  Arabian  Nights "  in  the  very 
remarkable  translation  recently  published 
by  Dr.  Mardrus ;  and  I  marvelled  at  the 
extraordinary  picture  it  gives  of  the 
ancient,  long-vanished  civilisations.  Not 
in  the  Odyssey  or  the  Bible,  in  Xenophon 
or  Plutarch,  could  their  teaching  be  more 
77 


The  Buried  Temple 

clearly  set  forth.  There  is  one  story  that 
the  Sultana  Schahrazade  tells  —  it  is  one 
of  the  very  finest  the  volume  contains  — 
that  reveals  a  life  as  pure  and  admirable 
as  mankind  has  ever  known;  a  life  replete 
with  beauty,  happiness,  and  love ;  spon- 
taneous and  vivid,  intelligent,  flourishing, 
and  refined ;  an  abundant  life  that,  to  a 
certain  point,  comes  as  near  truth  as  a 
life  well  can.  It  is,  in  many  respects, 
almost  as  perfect  in  its  moral  as  in  its 
material  civilisation.  And  the  pillars  on 
which  this  incomparable  structure  of  hap- 
piness rests  —  like  pillars  of  light  support- 
ing the  light  —  are  formed  of  ideas  of 
justice  so  delicate,  counsels  of  wisdom  so 
deeply  penetrating,  that  we  of  to-day, 
who  are  less  fine  in  grain,  less  eager  and 
buoyant,  have  lost  the  power  to  formulate 
or  to  discern  them.  And  for  all  that, 
this  abode  of  felicity,  that  harbours  a 
moral  life  so  active  and  vigorous,  so 
78 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

noble,  so  graciously  grave,  —  this  palace, 
wherein  the  purest  and  holiest  wisdom 
governs  the  pleasures  of  rejoicing  man- 
kind—  is  in  its  entirety  based  on  so  great 
an  injustice,  is  enclosed  by  so  vast,  so 
profound,  so  frightful  an  iniquity,  that 
the  wretchedest  man  of  us  all  would 
shrink  in  dismay  from  its  glittering,  gem- 
bestrewn  threshold.  But  of  this  iniquity 
they  who  linger  in  that  marvellous  dwell- 
ing have  not  the  remotest  suspicion.  It 
would  seem  that  they  never  draw  near  to 
a  window ;  or  that,  should  one  by  some 
chance  fly  open  and  reveal  to  their  sorrow- 
ful gaze  the  misery  strewn  in  the  midst 
of  the  revels  and  feasting,  they  still  would 
be  blind  to  the  crime  which  was  infinitely 
more  revolting,  infinitely  more  monstrous, 
than  the  most  appalling  poverty :  the 
crime  of  the  slavery,  and  the  even  more 
terrible  degradation,  of  their  women.  For 
these,  however  exalted  their  position,  and 
79 


The  Buried  Temple 

at  the  moment  even  when  they  are  speak- 
ing to  the  men  round  about  them  of  good- 
ness and  justice  ;  when  they  are  reminding 
them  of  their  most  touching  and  generous 
duties — these  women  never  are  more  than 
mere  objects  of  pleasure,  to  be  bought, 
or  sold,  or  given  away,  in  a  moment 
of  gratitude,  ostentation  or  drunkenness, 
to  any  barbarous  or  hideous  master. 

[26] 

"  They  tell  us,"  says  the  beautiful  slave 
Nozhatan,  as,  concealed  behind  a  curtain 
of  silk  and  of  pearls,  she  speaks  to  Prince 
Sharkan  and  the  wise  men  of  the  king- 
dom,—  "  they  tell  us  that  the  Khalif  Omar 
set  forth  one  night,  in  the  company  of  the 
venerable  Aslam  Abou-Zeid,  and  that  he 
beheld,  far  away  from  his  palace,  a  fire 
that  was  burning ;  and  drew  near,  as  he 
thought  that  his  presence  might  perhaps 
be  of  service.  And  he  saw  a  poor  woman 
80 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

♦vho  was  kindling  wood  underneath  a 
caldron,  and  by  her  side  were  two  little 
wretched  children,  groaning  most  pit- 
eously.  And  Omar  said,  *  Peace  unto 
thee,  O  woman  !  What  dost  thou  here, 
alone  in  the  night  and  the  cold  ?  '  And 
she  answered,  'Lord,  I  am  making  this 
water  to  boil,  that  my  children  may  drink, 
who  perish  of  hunger  and  cold  ;  but  for 
the  misery  we  have  to  bear,  Allah  will 
surely  one  day  ask  reckoning  of  Omar 
the  Khalif.'  And  the  Khalif,  who  was  in 
disguise,  was  much  moved,  and  he  said  to 
her,  *  But  dost  thou  think,  O  woman,  that 
Omar  can  know  of  thy  wretchedness,  see- 
ing that  he  does  not  relieve  it  ? '  And  she 
answered,  *  Wherefore,  then,  is  Omar  the 
Khalif  if  he  be  unaware  of  the  misery  of 
his  people  and  of  each  one  of  his  sub- 
jects ?  *  Then  the  Khalif  was  silent  and 
he  said  to  Aslam  Abou-Zeid,  *  Let  us  go 
quickly  from  hence.*  And  he  hastened 
6  8i 


The  Buried  Temple 

until  he  had  reached  the  storehouse  of  his 
kitchens,  and  he  entered  therein  and  drew 
forth  a  sack  of  flour  from  the  midst  of 
the  other  sacks,  and  also  a  jar  that  was 
filled  to  the  brim  with  sheep  fat,  and  he 
said  to  Abou-Zeid,  *  O  Abou-Zeid,  help 
thou  me  to  charge  these  on  my  back.* 
But  Abou-Zeid  refused,  and  he  cried, 
*  Suffer  that  I  carry  them  upon  my  back 
O  Commander  of  the  Faithful.'  And 
Omar  said  calmly  to  him,  *  Wilt  thou 
also,  O  Abou-Zeid,  bear  the  weight  of  my 
sins  on  the  Day  of  Resurrection  ? '  And 
Abou-Zeid  was  obliged  to  lay  the  jar 
filled  with  fat  and  the  sack  of  flour  on  the 
Khalif's  back.  And  Omar  hastened,  thus 
laden,  until  he  had  once  again  reached  the 
poor  woman;  and  he  took  of  the  flour, 
and  he  took  of  the  fat,  and  placed  these 
in  the  caldron  over  the  fire  ;  and  with  his 
own  hands  did  he  then  get  ready  the 
food,  and  he  quickened  the  fire  with  his 
82 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

breath;  and  as  he  bent  over,  his  beard 
being  long,  the  smoke  from  the  wood 
forced  its  way  through  the  beard  of  the 
Khalif.  And  at  last,  when  the  food  was 
prepared,  Omar  offered  it  unto  the  woman 
and  the  two  little  children  ;  and  with  his 
breath  did  he  cool  the  food  while  these 
ate  their  fill.  Then  he  left  them  the  sack 
of  flour  and  the  jar  of  fat ;  and  he  went 
on  his  way  and  said  unto  Aslam  Abou- 
Zeid,  *  O  Abou-Zeid,  the  light  from  this 
fire  that  I  have  beheld  to-day  has  enlight- 
ened me  also.'" 

[27] 

And  it  is  thus  that,  a  little  further  on, 
there  speaks  to  a  very  wise  king  one  of 
five  pensive  maidens  whom  this  king  is 
invited  to  buy.  "  Know  thou,  O  King," 
she  says,  "  that  the  most  beautiful  deed 
one  can  'do  is  the  deed  that  is  disinter- 
ested. And  so  do  they  tell  us  that  in 
83 


The  Buried  Temple 

Israel  once  were  two  brothers,  and  that  one 
asked  the  other,  *  Of  all  the  deeds  thou 
hast  done,  which  was  the  most  wicked  ?  * 
And  his  brother  replied,  *  This :  as  I 
passed  by  a  hen-roost  one  day  I  stretched 
out  my  arm  and  I  seized  a  chicken  and 
strangled  it,  and  then  flung  it  back  into 
the  roost.  That  is  the  wickedest  deed 
of  my  life.  And  thou,  O  my  brother, 
what  is  thy  wickedest  action  ?  *  And  he 
answered,  *That  I  prayed  to  Allah  one 
day  to  demand  a  favour  of  him.  For  it 
is  only  when  the  soul  is  simply  uplifted 
on  high  that  prayer  can  be  beautiful.*  " 
And  one  of  her  companions,  captive 
and  slave  like  herself,  also  speaks  to  the 
king.  "  Learn  to  know  thyself! "  she  says. 
"  Learn  to  know  thyself!  And  do  thou 
not  act  till  then.  And  do  thou  then  only 
act  in  accordance  with  all  thy  desires,  but 
having  great  care  always  that  thou  do  not 
injure  thy  neighbour." 
84 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

To  this  last  formula  our  morality  of 
to-day  has  nothing  to  add ;  nor  can  we 
conceive  a  precept  that  shall  be  more  com- 
plete. At  most  we  could  widen  the  mean- 
ing of  the  word  "  neighbour,"  and  ex- 
pand, extend,  and  raise,  render  somewhat 
more  subtle  and  more  elastic,  that  of  the 
word  "  injure."  And  the  book  in  which 
these  words  are  found  is  a  monument  of 
horror,  notwithstanding  all  its  flowers  and 
all  its  wisdom ;  a  monument  of  horror  and 
blood  and  tears,  of  despotism  and  slavery. 
And  they  are  all  slaves,  those  who  pro- 
nounce these  words,  A  merchant  buys 
them,  I  know  not  where,  and  sells  them 
to  some  old  hag  who  teaches  them,  or 
causes  them  to  be  taught,  philosophy, 
poetry,  all  Eastern  sciences,  in  order  that 
one  day  they  may  become  gifts  worthy  of 
a  king.  And  when  their  education  is 
finished,  and  their  beauty  and  wisdom 
call  forth  the  admiration  of  all  who  ap- 
8S 


The  Buried  Temple 

proach  them,  the  industrious,  prudent 
old  woman  does  indeed  offer  them  to  a 
very  wise,  very  just  king.  And  when 
this  very  wise,  very  just  king  has  taken 
their  virginity  from  them  and  seeks  other 
loves,  he  will  probably  bestow  them  (I 
have  forgotten  the  end  of  this  particular 
story,  but  it  is  the  invariable  destiny  of 
all  the  heroines  of  these  marvellous 
legends)  on  his  viziers.  And  these  viziers 
will  give  them  away  in  exchange  for  a 
vase  of  perfume,  for  a  belt  that  is  studded 
with  jewels,  or  perhaps  despatch  to  a 
distant  country,  to  conciliate  a  powerful 
protector,  or  a  hideous,  but  dreaded,  rival. 
And  these  women,  so  fully  conscious  of 
themselves,  whose  gaze  can  penetrate  so 
deeply  into  the  consciousness  of  others ; 
these  women  who  forever  are  pondering 
the  loftiest,  grandest  problems  of  justice,  of 
the  morality  of  men  and  of  nations,  never 
throw  one  questioning  glance  on  their  fate, 
86 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

or  for  an  instant  suspect  the  abominable 
injustice  whereof  they  are  the  victims. 
Nor  do  those  suspect  it  either  who  listen 
to  them,  and  love  and  admire  and  under- 
stand them.  And  we  who  marvel  at  this 
—  we  who  also  reflect  on  justice  and 
virtue,  on  pity  and  love  —  are  we  so  sure 
that  they  who  come  after  us  shall  not 
some  day  find,  in  our  present  social  condi- 
tion, a  spectacle  no  less  disconcerting  ? 

[28] 

It  is  difficult  for  us  to  imagine  what  the 
ideal  justice  will  be,  for  every  thought  of 
ours  that  tends  towards  it  is  clogged  by 
the  injustice  wherein  we  still  live.  Who 
shall  say  what  new  laws  and  relations  will 
stand  revealed  when  the  misfortunes  and 
inequalities  due  to  the  action  of  man  shall 
have  been  swept  away ;  when,  in  accord- 
ance with  the  principles  of  evolutionary 
morality,  each  individual  shall  "  reap  the 
87 


The  Buried  Temple 

results,  good  or  bad,  of  his  own  nature, 
and  of  the  consequences  that  ensue  from 
that  nature  ?  "  At  present  things  happen 
otherwise;  and  we  may  unhesitatingly 
declare  that,  as  far  as  the  material  condi- 
tion of  the  vast  bulk  of  mankind  is  con- 
cerned, the  connection  between  conduct 
and  consequences  —  to  use  Spencer's 
formula  —  exists  only  in  the  most  ludi- 
crous, arbitrary,  and  iniquitous  fashion. 
Is  there  not  something  of  audacity  in  our 
imagining  that  our  thoughts  can  possibly 
be  just  when  the  body  of  each  one  of  us 
is  steeped  to  the  neck  in  injustice  ?  And 
from  this  injustice  no  man  is  free,  be  it  to 
his  loss  or  his  gain ;  there  is  not  one 
whose  efforts  are  not  disproportionately 
rewarded,  receiving  either  too  much  or  too 
little ;  not  one  who  is  not  either  advan- 
taged or  handicapped.  And  endeavour 
as  we  may  to  detach  our  mind  from  this 
inveterate  injustice,  this  lingering  trace  of 
88 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

the  sub-human  morality  needful  for  primi- 
tive races,  it  is  idle  to  think  that  our 
thoughts  can  be  as  strenuous,  as  inde- 
pendent or  clear,  as  they  might  have  been 
had  the  last  vestige  of  this  injustice  dis- 
appeared ;  it  is  idle  to  think  that  they  can 
achieve  the  same  result.  The  side  of 
the  human  mind  that  can  attain  a  region 
loftier  than  reality  is  necessarily  timid  and 
hesitating.  Human  thought  is  capable 
of  many  things  ;  it  has,  in  the  course  of 
time,  brought  startling  improvement  to 
bear  upon  what  seemed  immutable  in  the 
species  or  the  race.  But  even  at  the 
moment  when  it  is  pondering  the  trans- 
formation of  which  it  has  caught  a  dis- 
tant glimpse,  the  improvement  that  it  so 
eagerly  desires,  even  then  it  is  still  think- 
ing, feeling,  seeing,  like  the  thing  that 
it  seeks  to  alter;  even  then  it  lies  captive 
beneath  the  yoke.  All  its  efforts  not- 
withstanding, it  is  practically  that  which 
89 


The  Buried  Temple 

it  would  change.  For  the  mind  of 
man  lacks  the  power  to  forecast  the 
future;  it  has  been  formed  rather  to  ex- 
plain, judge,  and  co-ordinate  that  which 
was ;  to  help,  foster,  and  make  known  what 
already  exists  but  so  far  cannot  be  seen  ; 
and  when  it  ventures  into  what  is  not  yet 
it  will  rarely  produce  anything  very  salu- 
tary or  very  enduring.  And  the  influ- 
ence of  the  social  condition  in  which  we 
exist  lies  heavy  upon  it.  How  can  we 
frame  a  satisfactory  idea  of  justice,  and 
ponder  it  loyally,  and  with  the  needful 
tranquillity,  when  injustice  surrounds  us  on 
every  side  ?  Before  we  can  study  justice, 
or  speak  of  it  with  advantage,  it  must 
become  what  it  is  capable  of  being :  a 
social  force,  irreproachable  and  actual. 
At  present  all  we  can  do  is  to  invoke  its 
unconscious,  secret,  and,  as  it  were,  almost 
imperceptible  effects.  We  contemplate  it 
from  the  shores  of  human  injustice  j 
90 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

never  yet  has  it  been  granted  us  to  gaze 
on  the  open  sea  beneath  the  inimitable, 
inviolate  sky  of  a  conscience  without  re- 
proach. If  men  had  at  least  done  all  that 
it  was  possible  for  them  to  do  in  their  own 
domain,  they  would  then  have  the  right 
to  go  further,  and  question  elsewhere ;  and 
their  thoughts  would  probably  be  clearer, 
were  their  consciences  more  at  ease. 

[  ^9  J 

And  further,  a  heavy  reproach  lies  on 
us,  and  chills  our  ardour,  whenever  we 
try  to  grow  better,  to  increase  our  knowl- 
edge, our  love,  our  forgiveness.  Though 
we  purify  our  consciousness  and  ennoble 
our  thoughts,  though  we  strive  to  render 
life  softer  and  sweeter  for  those  who  are 
near  us,  all  our  efforts  halt  at  our  thresh- 
old, and  have  no  influence  on  what  lies 
outside  our  door ;  and  the  moment  we 
leave  our  home  we  feel  that  we  have  done 
91 


The  Buried  Temple 

nothing,  that  there  is  nothing  for  us  to 
do,  and  that  we  are  taking  part,  ourselves 
notwithstanding,  in  the  great  anonymous 
injustice.  Is  it  not  almost  ludicrous  that 
we,  who  within  our  four  walls  strive  to  be 
noble  and  faithful,  pitiful,  simple,  and 
loyal ;  we  whose  consciousness  balances  the 
nicest,  most  delicate  problems,  and  rejects 
even  the  suspicion  of  a  bitter  thought, 
have  no  sooner  gone  into  the  street,  and 
met  faces  that  are  unfamiliar,  than,  at  that 
very  instant,  and  without  the  least  possibility 
of  our  having  it  otherwise,  all  pity,  equity, 
love  should  be  completely  ignored  by  us  ? 
What  dignity,  what  loyalty,  can  there  be 
in  this  double  life,  so  wise  and  humane, 
uplifted  and  thoughtful,  this  side  the 
threshold,  and  beyond  it  so  callous,  so 
instinctive  and  pitiless  ?  For  it  is  enough 
that  we  should  feel  the  cold  a  little  less 
than  the  labourer  who  passes  by,  that  we 
should  be  better  fed  or  clad  than  he,  that 
93 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

we  should  buy  any  object  that  is  not 
strictly  indispensable,  and  we  have  un- 
consciously returned,  through  a  thousand 
byways,  to  the  ruthless  act  of  primitive 
man  despoiling  his  weaker  brother.  There 
is  no  single  privilege  we  enjoy  but  close 
investigation  will  prove  it  to  be  the  re- 
sult of  a  perhaps  very  remote  abuse  of 
power,  an  unknown  violence  or  ruse  of 
long  ago  ;  and  all  these  we  set  in  motion 
again  as  we  sit  at  our  table,  stroll  idly 
through  the  town,  or  lie  at  night  in  a 
bed  that  our  own  hands  have  not  made. 
Nay,  what  is  even  the  leisure  that  enables 
us  to  improve,  to  grow  more  compassion- 
ate and  gentler,  to  think  more  fraternally 
of  the  injustice  others  endure  —  what  is 
this,  in  truth,  but  the  ripest  fruit  of  the 
great  injustice  ? 


93 


The  Buried  Temple 

[30] 

These  scruples,  I  know,  must  not  be 
carried  too  far ;  they  would  either  induce 
a  spirit  of  useless  revolt,  possibly  dis- 
astrous to  the  species  whose  mild  and 
mighty  sluggishness  we  are  bound  to 
respect;  or  they  would  lead  us  back  to  I 
know  not  what  mystic,  inert  renouncement, 
directly  opposed  to  the  most  evident  and 
unchanging  desires  of  life.  Life  has  laws 
that  we  call  inevitable  ;  but  we  are  already 
becoming  more  sparing  in  our  use  of 
the  word.  And  here  especially  do  we 
note  the  change  that  has  come  over  the 
attitude  of  the  wise  and  upright  man. 
Marcus  Aurelius  —  than  whom  perhaps 
none  ever  craved  more  earnestly  for  jus- 
tice, or  possessed  a  soul  more  wisely 
impressionable,  more  nobly  sensitive  — 
Marcus  Aurelius  never  asked  himself 
what  might  be  happening  outside  that 
94 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

admirable  little  circle  of  light  wherein  his 
virtue  and  consciousness,  his  divine  meek- 
ness and  piety,  had  gathered  those  who 
were  near  him,  his  friends  and  his  ser- 
vants. Infinite  iniquity,  he  knew  full  well, 
stretched  around  him  on  every  side ;  but 
with  this  he  had  no  concern.  To  him  it 
seemed  a  thing  that  must  be,  mysterious 
and  sacred  as  the  mighty  ocean ;  the 
boundless  domain  of  the  gods,  of  fatality, 
of  laws  unknown  and  superior,  irresistible, 
irresponsible,  and  eternal.  It  did  not  les- 
sen his  courage ;  on  the  contrary,  it 
enhanced  his  confidence,  his  concentration, 
and  spurred  him  upwards,  like  the  flame 
that,  confined  to  a  narrow  area,  rises 
higher  and  higher,  alone  in  the  night, 
urged  on  by  the  darkness.  He  accepted 
the  decree  of  fate,  that  allotted  slavery  to 
the  bulk  of  mankind.  Sorrowfully,  but 
with  full  conviction,  did  he  submit  to  the 
the  irrevocable  law;  wherein  he  once 
95 


The  Buried  Temple 

again  gave  proof  of  his  piety  and  his  vir- 
tue. He  retired  into  himself;  and  there, 
in  a  kind  of  sunless,  motionless  void,  be- 
came still  more  just,  still  more  humane. 
And  in  each  succeeding  century  do  we 
find  a  similar  ardour,  self-centred  and 
solitary,  among  those  who  were  wise  and 
good.  The  name  of  more  than  one  immov- 
able law  might  change,  but  its  infinite 
part  remained  ever  the  same ;  and  each 
one  regarded  it  with  the  like  resigned  and 
chastened  melancholy.  But  we  of  to-day 
—  what  course  are  we  to  pursue?  We 
know  that  iniquity  is  no  longer  necessary. 
We  have  invaded  the  region  of  the  gods, 
of  destiny  and  unknown  laws.  These 
may  still  control  disease  and  accident, 
perhaps,  no  less  than  the  tempest,  the 
lightning-flash,  and  most  of  the  mysteries 
of  death  ;  we  have  not  yet  penetrated 
to  them ;  but  we  are  well  aware  that 
poverty,  wretchedness,  hopeless  toil, 
96 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

slavery,    famine,   are  completely    outside 
their    domain.     It   is   we    who    organise 
these,   we    who    maintain   and    distribute 
them.     These  frightful  scourges,  that  have 
grown    so    familiar,   are   wielded    by   us 
alone ;    and    belief  in    their   superhuman 
origin  is  becoming  rarer  and  rarer.     The 
religious,  impassable   ocean  that  excused 
and  protected  the  retreat  into  himself  of 
the  sage  and  the  man  of  good,  now  only 
exists  as    a   vague   recollection.     To-day 
Marcus  Aurelius  could  no  longer  say  with 
the  same  serenity  :  "  They  go  in  search  of 
refuges,  of  rural   cottages,  of  mountains, 
of  the  sea-shore ;    thou  too  art  wont  to 
cherish  an  eager  desire  for  these  things. 
But  is  this  not  the  act  of  an   ignorant, 
unskilled  man,  seeing  that  it  is   granted 
thee   at   whatever    hour  thou  pleasest  to 
retire  within  thyself?     It  is  not  possible 
for  man  to  discover  a  retreat  more  tran- 
quil, less  disturbed  by   affairs,  than  that 
7  97 


The  Buried  Temple 

which  he  finds  in  his  soul ;  especially  if  he 
have  within  him  those  things  the  contem- 
plation of  which  suffices  to  procure  imme- 
diate enjoyment  of  the  perfect  calm, 
which  is  no  other,  to  my  mind,  than  the 
perfect  agreement  of  soul." 

Other  matters  concern  us  to-day  than 
this  agreement  of  soul ;  or  let  us  rather 
say  that  what  we  have  to  do  is  to  bring 
into  agreement  there  that  from  which  the 
soul  of  Marcus  Aurelius  was  free,  — 
three-fourths  of  the  sorrows  of  man- 
kind, in  a  word,  which  have  become  real 
to  us,  intelligible,  human,  urgent,  and  are 
no  longer  regarded  as  the  inexplicable, 
immutable,  intangible  decrees  of  fate. 

[31] 

This  does  not  imply,  however,  that  we 

should  abandon  the  old  sage's  desire  for 

"agreement;"  and  even  though  we  may 

not   be   entitled   to   expect   such   perfect 

98 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

"  agreement "  as  they  derived  from  their 
pardonable  egoism,  we  may  still  look  for 
agreement  of  a  provisional,  conditional 
kind.  And  although  such  "  agreement  " 
be  not  the  last  word  of  morality,  it  is  none 
the  less  indispensable  that  we  should  begin 
by  being  as  just  as  we  possibly  can  within 
ourselves  and  to  those  round  about  us,  our 
neighbours,  our  friends,  and  our  servants. 
It  is  at  the  moment  when  we  have  be- 
come absolutely  just  to  these,  and  within 
our  own  consciousness,  that  we  realise 
our  great  injustice  to  all  the  others.  The 
method  of  being  more  practically  just 
towards  these  last  is  not  yet  known  to  us ; 
to  return  to  great,  heroic  renouncements 
would  effect  but  little,  for  these  are  in- 
capable of  unanimous  action,  and  would 
probably  run  counter  to  the  profoundest 
laws  of  nature,  which  rejects  renounce- 
ment in  every  form  save  that  of  maternal 
love. 

99 


The  Buried  Temple 

This  practical  justice,  therefore,  remains 
the  secret  of  the  race.  Of  such  secrets 
it  has  many,  which  it  reveals  one  by 
one,  at  such  moments  of  history  as  be- 
come truly  critical ;  and  the  solutions  it 
offers  to  insuperable  difficulties  are  almost 
always  unexpected,  and  of  curious  sim- 
plicity. The  hour  approaches  perhaps 
when  it  will  speak  once  more.  Let  us 
hope,  without  being  too  sanguine ;  for 
we  must  bear  in  mind  that  humanity 
has  yet  by  no  means  emerged  from 
the  period  of  "  sacrificed  generations." 
History  has  known  no  others;  and  it  is 
possible  that,  to  the  end  of  time,  all 
generations  may  call  themselves  sacri- 
ficed. Nevertheless,  it  cannot  be  denied 
that  the  sacrifices,  however  unjust  and 
useless  they  still  may  be,  are  growing 
ever  less  inhuman  and  less  inevitable ; 
and  that  the  laws  which  govern  them 
are  becoming  better  and  better  known, 
xoo 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

and  would  seem  to  draw  nearer  and  nearer 
to  those  that  a  lofty  mind  might  accept 
without  being  pitiless. 

[32] 

It  must  be  admitted,  however,  that 
a  majestic,  redoubtable  slowness  attends 
the  movements  of  these  "ideas  of  the 
species."  Centuries  had  to  pass  by  be- 
fore it  dawned  upon  primitive  men,  who 
fled  from  each  other,  or  fought  when 
they  met  at  the  mouth  of  their  caverns, 
that  they  would  do  well  to  form  into 
groups,  and  unite  in  defence  against  the 
mighty  enemies  threatening  them  from 
without.  And  besides,  these  "  ideas  "  of 
the  species  will  of^en  be  widely  difl^erent 
from  those  that  the  wisest  man  might 
hold.  They  would  seem  to  be  independ- 
ent, spontaneous,  often  based  on  facts  of 
which  no  trace  is  shown  by  the  human 
reason  of  the  epoch  that  witnessed  their 

lOI 


TJNTVERSTTY  OP  CAT.tvornta 
SANTA  BA£idARA  COLLEGE  LIBRAJ 


The  Buried  Temple 

birth ;  and  indeed  there  is  no  graver 
or  more  disturbing  problem  before  the 
moralist  or  sociologist  than  that  of  deter- 
mining whether  all  his  efforts  can  hasten 
by  one  hour  or  divert  by  one  hair's- 
breadth  the  decisions  of  the  great,  anony- 
mous mass  which  proceeds,  step  by  step, 
towards  its  indiscernible  goal. 

Long  ago  —  so  long  inaeed  that  this 
is  one  of  the  first  affirmations  of  science, 
when,  quitting  the  bowels  of  the  earth, 
the  glaciers  and  grottoes,  it  ceased  to 
call  itself  geology  and  palaeontology  and 
became  the  history  of  man  —  humanity 
passed  through  a  crisis  not  wholly  unlike 
that  which  now  lies  ahead  of  it,  or  is 
actually  menacing  it  at  the  moment;  the 
difference  being  only  that  in  those  days 
the  dilemma  seemed  vastly  more  tragic 
and   more  unsolvable.     It  may  truly  be 

I02 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

sdd  that  mankind  never  has  known  a 
more  perilous  or  more  decisive  hour,  or 
a  period  when  it  drew  nearer  its  ruin  ; 
and  the  fact  that  we  exist  to-day  would 
appear  to  be  due  to  the  unexpected  ex- 
pedient which  saved  the  race  at  the 
moment  when  the  scourge  that  fed  on 
man's  very  reason,  on  all  that  was  best 
and  most  irresistible  in  his  instinct  of 
justice  and  injustice,  was  actually  on  the 
point  of  destroying  the  heroic  equilibrium 
between  the  desire  to  live  and  the  possi- 
bility of  living. 

I  refer  to  the  acts  of  violence,  rapine, 
outrage,  murder,  which  were  of  natural 
occurrence  among  the  earliest  human 
groups.  These  crimes,  which  will  prob- 
ably have  been  of  the  most  frightful 
description,  must  have  very  seriously  en- 
dangered the  existence  of  the  race ;  for 
vengeance  is  the  terrible,  and,  as  it  were, 
the  epidemic  form  which  the  craving  for 
103 


The  Buried  Temple 

justice  at  first  assumes.  Now  this  spirit 
of  vengeance,  abandoned  to  itself  and  for- 
ever multiplying,  —  revenge  followed  by 
the  revenge  of  revenge,  —  would  finally 
have  engulfed,  if  not  the  whole  of  man- 
kind, at  least  all  those  of  the  earliest  men 
who  were  possessed  of  energy  or  pride. 
We  find,  however,  that  among  these  bar- 
barous races,  as  among  most  of  the 
existing  savage  tribes  whose  habits  are 
known  to  us,  there  comes  a  time,  usually 
at  the  period  when  their  weapons  are 
growing  too  deadly,  when  this  vengeance 
suddenly  halts  before  a  singular  custom 
known  as  the  "  blood-tribute,"  or  the 
"  composition  for  murder,"  which  allows 
the  homicide  to  escape  the  reprisals  of 
the  victim's  friends  and  relations  by  pay- 
ment to  them  of  an  indemnity,  that,  from 
being  arbitrary  at  the  start,  soon  becomes 
strictly  graduated. 

In  the  whole  history   of  these   infant 
104 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

races,  in  whom  impulse  and  heroism  were 
the  predominant  factors,  there  is  nothing 
stranger,  nothing  more  astounding,  than 
this  almost  universal  custom,  which  for 
all  its  ingenuity  would  appear  almost  too 
long-suffering  and  mercantile.  May  we 
attribute  it  to  the  foresight  of  the  chiefs  ? 
We  find  it  in  races  among  whom  author- 
ity might  almost  be  said  to  be  entirely 
lacking.  Did  it  originate  among  the  old 
men,  the  thinkers,  the  sages,  of  the  prim- 
itive groups  ?  That  is  not  more  probable. 
For  underlying  this  custom  there  is  a 
thought  which  is  at  the  same  time  higher 
and  lower  than  could  be  the  thought  of 
an  isolated  prophet  or  genius  of  those 
barbarous  days.  The  sage,  the  prophet, 
the  genius  —  above  all,  the  untrained 
genius  —  is  rather  inclined  to  carry  to 
extremes  the  generous  and  heroic  tenden- 
cies of  the  clan  or  epoch  to  which  he 
belongs.  He  would  have  recoiled  in  dis- 
105 


The  Buried  Temple 

gust  from  this  timid,  cunning  evasion  of 
a  natural  and  sacred  revenge,  from  this 
odious  traffic  in  friendship,  fidelity,  and 
love.  Nor  is  it  conceivable,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  he  should  have  attained  suf- 
ficient loftiness  of  spirit  to  be  able  to  let 
his  gaze  travel  beyond  the  noblest  and 
most  incontestable  duties  of  the  moment, 
and  to  behold  only  the  superior  interest 
of  the  tribe  or  the  race :  that  mysterious 
desire  for  life  which  the  wisest  of  the  wise 
among  us  to-day  are  generally  unable  to 
perceive  or  to  justify  until  they  have 
wrought  grave  and  painful  conquest  over 
their  isolated  reason  and  their  heart. 

No,  it  was  not  the  thought  of  man 
which  found  the  solution.  On  the  con- 
trary, it  was  the  unconsciousness  of  the 
mass,  compelled  to  act  in  self-defence 
against  thoughts  too  intrinsically,  indi- 
vidually human  to  satisfy  the  irreducible 
exigencies  of  life  on  this  earth.  The 
zo6 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

species  is  extremely  patient,  extremely 
long-suffering.  It  will  bear  as  long  as 
it  can  and  carry  as  far  as  it  can  the 
burden  which  reason,  the  desire  for  im- 
provement, the  imagination,  the  passions, 
vices,  virtues,  and  feelings  natural  to  man, 
may  combine  to  impose  upon  it.  But 
at  the  moment  when  this  burden  be- 
comes too  overwhelming,  and  disaster 
threatens,  the  species  will,  instantaneously 
and  with  the  utmost  indifference,  fling  it 
aside.  It  is  careless  as  to  the  means ;  it 
will  adopt  the  one  that  is  nearest,  the 
simplest,  most  practical,  being  doubtless 
perfectly  satisfied  that  its  own  idea  is  the 
justest  and  best.  And  of  ideas  it  has 
only  one,  which  is  that  it  wishes  to  live ; 
and  truly  this  idea  surpasses  all  the  hero- 
ism, all  the  generous  dreams,  that  may 
have  reposed  in  the  burden  which  it  has 
discarded. 

And    indeed,   in    the    history   of  hu- 
107 


The  Buried  Temple 

man  reason,  the  greatest  and  the  justest 
thoughts  are  not  always  those  which  at- 
tain the  loftiest  heights.  It  happens 
somewhat  with  the  thoughts  of  men  as 
with  a  fountain ;  for  it  is  only  because 
the  water  has  been  imprisoned  and  es- 
capes through  a  narrow  opening  that 
it  soars  so  proudly  into  the  air.  As 
it  issues  from  this  opening  and  hurls  it- 
self towards  the  sky,  it  would  seem  to 
despise  the  great,  illimitable,  motionless 
lake  that  stretches  out  far  beneath  it. 
And  yet,  say  what  one  will,  it  is  the  lake 
that  is  right.  For  all  its  apparent  motion- 
lessness,  for  all  its  silence,  it  is  tranquilly 
accomplishing  the  immense  and  normal 
task  of  the  most  important  element  of 
our  globe ;  and  the  jet  of  water  is  merely 
a  curious  incident,  which  soon  returns  into 
the  universal  scheme.  To  us,  the  species 
is  the  great,  unerring  lake ;  and  this  even 
from  the  point  of  view  of  the  superior 
1 08 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

human  reason  that  it  would  seem  at  times 
to  offend.  Its  idea  is  the  vastest  of  all, 
and  contains  every  other;  it  embraces 
limitless  time  and  space.  And  does  not 
each  day  that  goes  by  reveal  more  and 
more  clearly  to  us  that  the  vastest  idea, 
no  matter  where  it  reside,  always  ends 
by  becoming  the  most  just  and  most 
reasonable,  the  wisest,  and  the  most 
beautiful  ? 

[34] 

There  are  times  when  we  ask  ourselves 
whether  it  might  not  be  well  for  humanity 
that  its  destinies  should  be  governed  by 
the  superior  men  among  us,  the  great 
sages,  rather  than  by  the  instincts  of  the 
species,  that  are  always  so  slow,  and  often 
so  cruel. 

It  is  doubtful  whether  this  question 
could  be  answered  to-day  in  quite  the 
same  fashion  as  formerly.  It  would 
109 


The  Buried  Temple 

surely  have  been  highly  dangerous  to 
confide  the  destinies  of  the  species  to 
Plato  or  Aristotle,  Marcus  Aurelius, 
Shakespeare,  or  Montesquieu.  At  the 
very  worst  moments  of  the  French  Revo- 
lution, the  fate  of  the  people  was  in  the 
hands  of  philosophers  of  none  too  mean 
an  order.  It  cannot  be  denied,  however, 
that  in  our  time  the  habits  of  the  thinker 
have  undergone  a  great  change.  He  has 
ceased  to  be  speculative  or  Utopian :  he  is 
no  longer  exclusively  intuitive.  In  poli- 
tics as  in  literature,  in  philosophy  as  in  all 
the  sciences,  he  displays  less  imagination, 
but  his  powers  as  an  observer  have  grown. 
He  inclines  rather  to  concentrate  his  atten- 
tion on  the  thing  that  is,  to  study  it  and 
strive  at  its  organisation,  than  to  precede 
it,  or  endeavour  to  create  what  is  not  yet, 
or  never  shall  be.  And  therefore  he  may 
possibly  have  some  claim  to  more  au- 
thoritative utterance ;  nor  would  so  much 
zxo 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

danger  attend  his  more  direct  intervention. 
It  must  be  admitted,  however,  that  there  is 
no  greater  likelihood  now  than  in  former 
times  of  such  intervention  being  permitted 
him.  Nay,  there  is  less,  perhaps ;  for 
having  become  more  circumspect  and  less 
blinded  by  narrow  convictions,  he  will  be 
less  audacious,  less  imperious,  and  less 
impatient.  And  yet  it  is  possible  that, 
finding  himself  in  natural  sympathy  with 
the  species  which  he  is  content  merely  to 
observe,  he  will  by  slow  degrees  acquire 
more  and  more  influence ;  so  that  here 
again,  in  ultimate  analysis,  it  is  the  species 
that  will  be  right,  the  species  that  will 
decide ;  for  it  will  have  guided  him  who 
observes  it,  and  therefore,  in  following 
him  whom  it  has  guided,  it  will  truly  only 
be  following  its  own  unconscious,  formless 
desires,  which  will  have  been  expressed 
by  him,  and  by  him  brought  into  light. 


HI 


The  Buried  Temple 

[35] 

Until  such  time  as  the  species  shall 
discover  the  new  and  needful  experiment — 
and  this  it  will  quickly  do  when  the  danger 
becomes  more  acute  ;  nay,  for  all  we  know, 
the  expedient  may  have  already  been 
found,  and,  entirely  unsuspected  of  us,  be 
already  transforming  part  of  our  destinies 
—  until  such  time,  while  bound  to  act  in 
external  matters  as  though  our  brothers* 
salvation  depended  entirely  on  our  exer- 
tions, it  is  open  to  us,  no  less  than  to  the 
sages  of  old,  to  retire  occasionally  within 
ourselves.  We  in  our  turn  shall  perhaps 
find  there  "one  of  those  things"  of  which 
the  contemplation  shall  suffice  to  bring  us 
instantaneous  enjoyment,  if  not  of  the 
perfect  calm,  at  least  of  an  indestructible 
hope.  Though  nature  appear  unjust, 
though  nothing  authorise  us  to  declare 
that  a  superior  power,  or  the  intellect  of  the 
112 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

universe,  rewards  or  punishes,  here  below 
or  elsewhere,  in  accordance  with  the  laws 
of  our  consciousness  or  with  other  laws 
that  we  shall  some  day  admit ;  and  finally, 
though  between  man  and  man,  in  other 
words,  in  our  relations  with  our  fellows, 
our  admirable  desire  for  equity  translate 
itself  into  a  justice  that  is  always  incom- 
plete, at  the  mercy  of  every  error  of 
reason,  of  every  ambush  laid  by  personal 
interest,  and  of  all  the  evil  habits  of  a 
social  condition  that  still  is  sub-human,  — 
it  is  none  the  less  certain  that  an  image 
of  that  invisible  and  incorruptible  justice, 
which  we  have  vainly  sought  in  the  sky 
or  the  universe,  reposes  in  the  depths  of 
the  moral  life  of  every  man.  And  though 
its  method  of  action  be  such  as  to  cause 
it  to  pass  unperceived  of  most  of  our 
fellows,  often  indeed  of  our  own  conscious- 
ness, though  all  that  it  does  be  hidden 
and  intangible,  it  is  none  the  less  pro- 
8  113 


The  Buried  Temple 

foundly  human  and  profoundly  real.  It 
would  seem  to  hear,  to  examine,  all  that 
we  say,  and  think,  and  strive  for,  in  our 
exterior  life  ;  and  if  it  find  a  little  sincerity 
beneath,  a  little  earnest  desire  for  good, 
it  will  transform  these  into  moral  forces 
that  shall  extend  and  illumine  our  inner 
life,  and  help  us  to  better  thoughts,  to 
better  speech  and  endeavour,  in  the  time 
to  come.  It  will  not  add  to,  or  take  from, 
our  wealth,  it  will  bring  no  immunity  from 
disease  or  from  lightning,  it  will  not  pro- 
long by  one  hour  the  life  of  the  being  we 
cherish  ;  but  if  we  have  learned  to  reflect 
and  to  love :  if,  in  other  words,  heart  and 
brain  have  both  done  their  duty,  it  will 
establish  in  heart  and  brain  a  contentment 
that,  though  perhaps  stripped  of  illusion, 
shall  still  be  inexhaustible  and  noble ;  it 
will  confer  a  dignity  of  existence,  an  in- 
telligence, that  shall  suffice  to  sustain  our 
life  after  the  loss  of  our  wealth,  after 
114 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

the  stroke  of  disease  or  lightning  has 
fallen,  after  the  loved  one  has  forever 
quitted  our  arms.  A  good  thought  or 
deed  brings  a  reward  to  our  heart  that 
it  cannot,  in  the  absence  of  a  universal 
judge  of  nature,  extend  to  the  things 
around.  It  endeavours  to  create  within 
us  the  happiness  it  is  unable  to  produce 
in  our  material  life.  Denied  all  external 
outlet,  it  fills  our  soul  the  more.  It 
prepares  the  space  that  soon  shall  be 
required  by  our  developing  intellect,  our 
expanding  peace  and  love.  Helpless 
against  the  laws  of"  nature,  it  is  all-power- 
ful over  those  that  govern  the  happy 
equilibrium  of  human  consciousness.  And 
this  is  true  of  every  stage  of  thought,  of 
every  class  of  action.  A  vast  distance 
might  seem  to  divide  the  labourer,  who 
brings  up  his  children  honourably,  lives 
his  humble  life  and  honourably  does  the 
work  that  falls  to  his  lot,  from  the  man 
"5 


The  Buried  Temple 

who  steadfastly  perseveres  in  moral  hero- 
ism ;  but  each  of  these  is  acting  and 
living,  on  the  same  plane  as  the  other, 
and  the  same  loyal,  consoling  region  re- 
ceives them  both.  And  though  it  be 
certain  that  what  we  say  and  do  must 
largely  influence  our  material  happiness, 
yet,  in  ultimate  analysis,  it  is  only  by 
means  of  the  spiritual  organs  that  even 
material  happiness  can  be  fully  and  per- 
manently enjoyed.  Hence  the  prepon- 
derating importance  of  thought.  But  of 
supreme  importance,  from  the  point  of 
view  of  the  reception  we  shall  oflfer  to  the 
joys  and  sorrows  of  life,  is  the  character, 
the  frame  of  mind,  the  moral  condition, 
that  the  things  we  have  said,  and  done, 
and  thought,  will  have  created  within  us. 
Here  there  is  evidence  of  admirable  jus- 
tice; and  the  intimate  happiness  that 
our  moral  being  derives  from  the  constant 
striving  of  the  mind  and  heart  for  good 
zi6 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

becomes  the  more  comprehensible  when 
we  realise  that  this  happiness  is  only  the 
surface  of  the  goodly  thought,  or  feeling, 
that  is  shining  within  our  heart.  Here 
may  we  indeed  find  that  intelligent,  moral 
bond  between  cause  and  effect  that  we 
have  vainly  sought  in  the  external  world ; 
here,  in  moral  matters,  reigning  over  the 
good  and  evil  that  are  warring  in  the 
depths  of  our  consciousness,  may  we  in 
truth  discover  a  justice  exactly  similar  to 
the  one  which  we  could  desire  to  recognise 
in  physical  matters.  But  whence  do  we 
derive  this  desire  if  not  from  the  justice 
within  us ;  and  is  it  not  because  this 
justice  is  so  mighty  and  active  in  our 
heart  that  we  are  reluctant  to  believe 
in  its  non-existence  in  the  universe  ? 

[36] 

We  have  spoken   at  great  length   of 
justice;   but  is  it  not  the  great  mystery 
117 


The  Buried  Temple 

of  man,  the  one  that  tends  to  take  the 
place  of  most  of  the  spiritual  mysteries 
that  govern  his  destiny  ?  It  has  dethroned 
more  than  one  god,  more  than  one  name- 
less power.  It  is  the  star  evolved  from 
the  nebulous  mass  of  our  instincts  and 
our  incomprehensible  life.  It  is  not  the 
solution  of  the  enigma ;  and  when,  in  the 
fulness  of  time,  it  shall  become  clearer  to 
us,  and  shall  truly  reign  all  over  the  earth, 
there  will  come  to  us  no  greater  knowl- 
edge of  what  we  are,  or  why  we  are, 
whence  we  come  or  whither  we  go ;  but 
we  shall  at  least  have  obeyed  the  first 
word  of  the  enigma,  and  shall  proceed, 
with  a  freer  spirit  and  a  more  tranquil 
heart,  to  the  search  for  its  last  secret. 

Finally,  it  comprises  all  the  human  vir- 
tues ;  and  none  but  itself  can  offer  the 
welcoming  smile  whereby  these  are  en- 
nobled and  purified,  none  but  itself  can 
accord  them  the  right  to  penetrate  deep 
ii8 


The  Mystery  of  Justice 

into  our  moral  life.  For  every  virtue 
must  be  maleficent  and  steeped  in  artifice 
that  cannot  support  the  fixed  and  eager 
regard  of  justice.  And  so  do  we  find  it 
at  the  heart  of  every  ideal.  It  is  at 
the  centre  of  our  love  of  truth,  at  the 
centre  of  our  love  of  beauty.  It  is  kind- 
ness and  pity,  it  is  generosity,  heroism, 
love ;  for  all  these  are  the  acts  of  justice 
of  one  who  has  risen  sufficiently  high  to 
perceive  that  justice  and  injustice  are  not 
exclusively  confined  to  what  lies  before 
him,  to  the  narrow  circle  of  obligations 
chance  may  have  imposed,  but  that  they 
stretch  far  beyond  years,  beyond  neigh- 
bouring destinies,  beyond  what  he  re- 
gards as  his  duty,  beyond  what  he  loves, 
beyond  what  he  seeks  and  encounters,  be- 
yond what  he  approves  or  respects,  beyond 
his  doubts  and  his  fears,  beyond  the 
wrong-doing  and  even  the  crimes  of  the 
men,  his  brothers. 

119 


II 

THE   EVOLUTION   OF 
MYSTERY 


II 

THE    EVOLUTION  OF 
MYSTERY 

[I] 

IT  is  not  unreasonable  to  believe  that 
the  paramount  interest  of  life,  all  that 
is  truly  lofty  and  remarkable  in  the  des- 
tiny of  man,  reposes  almost  entirely  in 
the  mystery  that  surrounds  us ;  in  the 
two  mysteries,  it  may  be,  that  are  might- 
iest, most  dreadful  of  all  —  fatality  and 
death.  And  indeed  there  are  many  whom 
the  fatigue  induced  in  their  minds  by 
the  natural  uncertainties  of  science  has 
almost  compelled  to  accept  this  belief.  I, 
too,  believe,  though  in  a  somewhat  differ- 
ent fashion,  that  the  study  of  mystery  in 
all  its  forms  is  the  noblest  to  which  the 
123 


The  Buried  Temple 

mind  of  man  can  devote  itself;  and  truly 
it  has  ever  been  the  study  and  care  of 
those  who,  in  science  and  art,  in  philos- 
ophy and  literature,  have  refused  to  be 
satisfied  merely  to  observe  and  portray  the 
trivial,  well-recognised   truths,  facts,  and 
realities  of  life.     And  we  find   that  the 
success  of  these  men  in  their  endeavour, 
the  depth  of  their  insight  into  all  that  they 
knew,  has  most  strictly  accorded  with  the 
respect  in  which  they  held  all  they  did 
not   know,   with   the    dignity   that   their 
mind  or  imagination  was  able  to  confer 
on  the  sum  of  unknowable  forces.     Our 
consciousness  of  the  unknown  wherein  we 
have  being  gives  life  a  meaning  and  gran- 
deur which  must  of  necessity  be  absent  if 
we  persist  in  considering  only  the  things 
that  are  known  to  us ;  if  we  too  readily 
incline  to  believe  that  these  must  greatly 
transcend  in  importance  the  things  which 
we  know  not  yet.    " 

"4 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

[*] 

It  behoves  every  man  to  frame  for  him- 
self his  own  general  conception  of  the 
world.  On  this  conception  reposes  his 
whole  human  and  moral  existence.  But 
this  general  conception  of  the  world,  when 
closely  examined,  is  truly  no  more  than  a 
general  conception  of  the  unknown.  And 
we  must  be  careful ;  we  have  not  the 
right,  when  ideas  so  vast  confront  us,  ideas 
the  results  of  which  are  so  highly  impor- 
tant, to  select  the  one  which  seems  most 
magnificent  to  us,  most  beautiful,  or  most 
attractive.  The  duty  lies  on  us  to  choose 
the  idea  which  seems  truest,  or  rather,  the 
only  one  which  seems  true ;  for  I  decline 
to  believe  that  we  can  sincerely  hesitate 
between  the  truth  that  is  only  apparent 
and  the  one  that  is  real.  The  moment 
must  always  come  when  we  feel  that  one 
of  these  two  is  possessed  of  more  truth 
"5 


The  Buried  Temple 

than  the  other.  And  to  this  truth  we 
should  cling:  in  our  actions,  our  words, 
and  our  thoughts ;  in  our  art,  in  our 
science,  in  the  life  of  our  feelings  and 
intellect.  Its  definition,  perhaps,  may 
elude  us.  It  may  possibly  bring  not 
one  grain  of  reassuring  conviction.  Nay, 
essentially,  perhaps,  it  may  be  but  the 
merest  impression,  though  profounder  and 
more  sincere  than  any  previous  impres- 
sion. These  things  do  not  matter.  It  is 
not  imperative  that  the  truth  we  have 
chosen  should  be  unimpeachable,  or  of 
absolute  certainty.  There  is  already  great 
gain  in  our  having  been  brought  to  ex- 
perience that  the  truths  we  had  loved 
before  did  not  accord  with  reality,  or  with 
faithful  experience  of  life ;  and  we  have 
every  reason,  therefore,  to  cherish  our 
truth  with  heartiest  gratitude  until  its 
own  turn  shall  come  to  experience  the  fate 
it  inflicted  on  its  predecessor.  The  great 
xa6 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

mischief,  the  one  which  destroys  our 
moral  existence  and  threatens  the  integ- 
rity of  our  mind  and  our  character,  is  not 
that  we  should  deceive  ourselves  and  love 
an  uncertain  truth,  but  that  we  should  re- 
main constant  to  one  in  which  we  no  longer 
wholly  believe. 

[3] 

If  we  sought  nothing  more  than  to  in- 
vest our  conception  of  the  unknown  with 
the  utmost  possible  grandeur  and  trag- 
edy, magnificence  and  might,  there  would 
be  no  need  of  such  restrictions.  From 
many  points  of  view,  doubtless,  the  most 
beautiful,  most  touching,  most  religious 
attitude  in  face  of  mystery  is  silence,  and 
prayer,  and  fearful  acceptance.  When 
this  immense,  irresistible  force  confronts 
us  —  this  inscrutable,  ceaselessly  vigilant 
power,  humanly  superhuman,  sovereignly 
intelligent,  and,  for  all  we  know,  even  per- 
127 


The  Buried  Temple 

sonal  —  must  it  not,  at  first  sight,  seem 
more  reverent,  worthier,  to  offer  complete 
submission,  trying  only  to  master  our 
terror,  than  tranquilly  to  set  on  foot  a 
patient,  laborious  investigation  ?  But  is 
the  choice  possible  to  us;  have  we  still 
the  right  to  choose  ?  The  beauty  or  dig- 
nity of  the  attitude  we  shall  assume  no 
longer  is  matter  of  moment.  It  is  truth 
and  sincerity  that  are  called  for  to-day 
for  the  facing  of  all  things  —  how  much 
more  when  mystery  confronts  us !  In 
the  past,  the  prostration  of  man,  his 
bending  the  knee,  seemed  beautiful  be- 
cause of  what,  in  the  past,  seemed  true. 
We  have  acquired  no  fresh  certitude, 
perhaps ;  but  for  us,  none  the  less,  the 
truth  of  the  past  has  ceased  to  be  true. 
We  have  not  bridged  the  unknown ;  but 
still,  though  we  know  not  what  it  is,  we 
do  partially  know  what  it  is  not;  and  it  is 
before  this  we  should  bow  were  the  atti- 
laS 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

tude  of  our  fathers  to  be  once  more 
assumed  by  us.  For  although  it  has  not, 
perhaps,  been  incontrovertibly  proved  that 
the  unknown  is  neither  vigilant  nor  per- 
sonal, neither  sovereignly  intelligent  nor 
sovereignly  just,  or  that  it  possesses  none 
of  the  passions,  intentions,  virtues,  or 
vices  of  man,  it  is  still  incomparably  more 
probable  that  the  unknown  is  entirely  in- 
different to  all  that  appears  of  supreme 
importance  in  this  life  of  ours.  It  is  in- 
comparably more  probable  that  if,  in  the 
vast  and  eternal  scheme  of  the  unknown, 
a  minute  and  ephemeral  place  be  reserved 
for  man,  his  actions,  be  he  the  strongest 
or  weakest,  the  best  or  worst  of  men, 
will  be  as  unimportant  there  as  the 
movements  of  the  obscurest  geological 
cell  in  the  history  of  ocean  or  continent. 
Though  it  may  not  have  been  irrefutably 
shown  that  the  infinite  and  invisible  are 
not  for  ever  hovering  round  us,  dealing 
9  129 


The  Buried  Temple 

out  sorrow  or  joy  in  accordance  with  our 
good  or  evil  intentions,  guiding  our  des- 
tiny step  by  step,  and  preparing,  with  the 
help  of  innumerable  forces,  the  incompre- 
hensible but  eternal  law  that  governs  the 
accidents  of  our  birth,  our  future,  our 
death,  and  our  life  beyond  the  tomb,  it  is 
still  incomparably  more  probable  that  the 
invisible  and  infinite,  intervene  as  they 
may  at  every  moment  in  our  life,  enter 
therein  only  as  stupendous,  blind,  indiffer- 
ent elements ;  and  that,  though  they  pass 
over  us,  in  us,  penetrate  into  our  being, 
and  inspire  and  mould  our  life,  they  are 
as  careless  of  our  individual  existence  as 
air,  water,  or  light.  And  the  whole  of 
our  conscious  life,  the  life  that  forms  our 
one  certitude,  that  is  our  one  fixed  point 
in  time  and  space,  rests  upon  "incom- 
parable probabilities  "  of  this  nature ;  but 
rarely  are  they  as  "  incomparable "  as 
these. 

130 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

[4] 

The  hour  when  a  lofty  conviction  for- 
sakes us  should  never  be  one  of  regret. 
If  a  belief  we  have  clung  to  goes,  or  a 
spring  snaps  within  us ;  if  we  at  last  de- 
throne the  idea  that  so  long  has  held 
sway,  this  is  proof  of  vitality,  progress,  of 
our  marching  steadily  onwards,  and  mak- 
ing good  use  of  all  that  lies  to  our  hand. 
We  should  rejoice  at  the  knowledge  that 
the  thought  which  so  long  has  sustained 
us  is  proved  incapable  now  of  even  sus- 
taining itself.  And  though  we  have  noth- 
ing to  put  in  the  place  of  the  spring  that 
lies  broken,  there  need  still  be  no  cause 
for  sadness.  Far  better  the  place  remain 
empty  than  that  it  be  filled  by  a  spring 
which  the  rust  corrodes,  or  by  a  new 
truth  in  which  we  do  not  wholly  believe. 
And  besides,  the  place  is  not  really  empty. 
Determinate  truth  may  have  not  yet  ar- 
131 


The  Buried  Temple 

rived,  but  still,  in  its  own  deep  recess, 
there  hides  a  truth  without  name,  which 
waits  and  calls.  And  if  it  wait  and  call 
too  long  in  the  void,  and  nothing  arise  in 
the  place  of  the  vanished  spring,  it  still 
shall  be  found  that,  in  moral  no  less  than 
in  physical  life,  necessity  will  be  able  to 
create  the  organ  it  needs,  and  that  the  nega- 
tive truth  will  at  last  find  sufficient  force 
in  itself  to  set  the  idle  machinery  going. 
And  the  lives  that  possess  no  more  than 
one  force  of  this  kind  are  not  the  least 
strenuous,  the  least  ardent,  or  the  least 
useful. 

And  even  though  our  belief  forsake  us 
entirely,  it  still  will  take  with  it  nothing 
of  what  we  have  given,  nor  will  there  be 
lost  one  single  sincere,  religious,  disin- 
terested effort  that  we  have  put  forth  to 
ennoble  this  faith,  to  exalt  or  embellish  it. 
Every  thought  we  have  added,  each 
worthy  sacrifice  we  have  had  the  courage 
132 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

to  make  in  its  name,  will  have  left  its  in- 
delible mark  on  our  moral  existence. 
The  body  is  gone,  but  the  palace  it  built 
still  stands,  and  the  space  it  has  conquered 
will  remain  forever  unenclosed.  It  is  our 
duty,  and  one  we  dare  not  renounce,  to  pre- 
pare homes  for  truths  that  shall  come,  to 
maintain  in  good  order  the  forces  destined 
to  serve  them,  and  to  create  open  spaces 
within  us ;  nor  can  the  time  thus  employed 
be  possibly  wasted. 

[J] 

These  thoughts  have  arisen  within  me 
through  my  having  been  compelled,  a  few 
days  ago,  to  glance  over  two  or  three 
little  dramas  of  mine,  wherein  lies  re- 
vealed the  disquiet  of  a  mind  that  has 
given  itself  wholly  to  mystery,  —  a  disquiet 
legitimate  enough  in  itself,  perhaps,  but 
not  so  inevitable  as  to  warrant  its  own 
complacency.  The  keynote  of  these  little 
133 


The  Buried  Temple 

plays  is  dread  of  the  unknown  that  sur- 
rounds us.  I,  or  rather  some  obscure 
poetical  feeling  within  me  (for  with  the  sin- 
cerest  of  poets  a  division  must  often  be 
made  between  the  instinctive  feeling  of 
their  art  and  the  thoughts  of  their  real  life) 
seemed  to  believe  in  a  species  of  mon- 
strous, invisible,  fatal  power  that  gave 
heed  to  our  every  action,  and  was  hostile 
to  our  smile,  to  our  life,  to  our  peace  and 
our  love.  Its  intentions  could  not  be 
divined,  but  the  spirit  of  the  drama  as- 
sumed them  to  be  malevolent  always.  In 
its  essence,  perhaps,  this  power  was  just, 
but  only  in  anger ;  and  it  exercised  justice 
in  a  manner  so  crooked,  so  secret,  so  slug- 
gish and  remote,  that  its  punishments  — 
for  it  never  rewarded  —  took  the  sem- 
blance of  inexplicable,  arbitrary  acts  of 
fate.  We  had  there,  in  a  word,  more  or 
less  the  idea  of  the  God  of  the  Christians, 
blent  with  that  of  ancient  fatality,  lurking 
»34 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

in  nature's  impenetrable  twilight,  whence 
it  eagerly  watched,  contested,  and  saddened 
the  projects,  the  feelings,  the  thoughts,  and 
the  happiness  of  man. 

[6] 

This  unknown  would  most  frequently 
appear  in  the  shape  of  death.  The  pres- 
ence of  death  —  infinite,  menacing,  for 
ever  treacherously  active  —  filled  every 
interstice  of  the  poem.  The  problem  of 
existence  was  answered  only  by  the  enigma 
of  annihilation.  And  it  was  a  callous, 
inexorable  death;  blind,  and  groping  its 
mysterious  way  with  only  chance  to  guide 
it;  laying  its  hands  preferentially  on  the 
youngest  and  the  least  unhappy,  since  these 
held  themselves  less  motionless  than 
others,  and  that  every  too  sudden  move- 
ment in  the  night  arrested  its  attention. 
And  around  it  were  only  poor  little  trem- 
bling, elementary  creatures,  who  shivered 
135 


The  Buried  Temple 

for  an  instant  and  wept,  oh  the  brink  of  a 
gulf;  and  their  words  and  their  tears  had 
importance  only  from  the  fact  that  each 
word  they  spoke  and  each  tear  they  shed 
fell  into  this  gulf,  and  were  at  times  so 
strangely  resonant  there  as  to  lead  one  to 
think  that  the  gulf  must  be  vast  if  tear  or 
word,  as  it  fell,  could  send  forth  so  con- 
fused and  muffled  a  sound. 

[7] 

Such  a  conception  of  life  is  not  healthy, 
whatever  show  of  reason  it  may  seem  to 
possess ;  and  I  would  not  allude  to  it 
here  were  it  not  for  the  fact  that  we  find 
this  idea,  or  one  closely  akin  to  it,  govern- 
ing the  hearts  of  most  men,  however 
tranquil,  or  thoughtful,  or  earnest  they 
may  be,  at  the  approach  of  the  slightest 
misfortune.  There  is  evidently  a  side  to 
our  nature  which,  notwithstanding  all  we 
may  learn  and  master,  and  the  certitudes 
136 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

we  may  acquire,  destines  us  never  to  be 
other  than  poor,  weak,  useless  creatures, 
consecrated  to  death,  and  playthings  of 
the  vast  and  heedless  forces  that  surround 
us.  We  appear  for  an  instant  in  limitless 
space,  our  one  appreciable  mission  the 
propagation  of  a  species  that  itself  has  no 
appreciable  mission  in  the  scheme  of  a 
universe  whose  extent  and  duration  baffle 
the  most  daring,  most  powerful  brain. 
This  is  a  truth ;  it  is  one  of  those  pro- 
found but  sterile  truths  which  the  poet 
may  salute  as  he  passes  on  his  way ;  but 
it  is  a  truth  in  the  neighbourhood  of  which 
the  man  with  the  thousand  duties  who  lives 
in  the  poet  will  do  well  not  to  abide  too 
long.  And  of  truths  such  as  this  there 
are  many  that  are  lofty  and  deserving  of 
all  our  respect,  but  in  their  domain  it 
were  unwise  to  lay  ourselves  down  and 
sleep.  So  many  truths  environ  us  that 
it  may  safely  be  said  that  few  men  can  be 
1J7 


The  Buried  Temole 

X 

found,  of  the  wickedest,  even,  who  have 
not  for  counsel  and  guide  a  grave  and 
respectable  truth.  Yes,  it  is  a  truth  — 
the  vastest,  most  certain  of  truths,  if  one 
will  —  that  our  life  is  nothing,  and  our 
efforts  the  merest  jest ;  our  existence,  that 
of  our  planet,  only  a  miserable  accident  in 
the  history  of  worlds ;  but  it  is  no  less  a 
truth  that,  to  us,  our  life  and  our  planet 
are  the  most  important,  nay,  the  only 
important  phenomena  in  the  history  of 
worlds.  And  of  these  truths  which  is  the 
truer?  Does  the  first  of  necessity  destroy 
the  second  ?  Without  the  second,  should 
we  have  had  the  courage  to  formulate  the 
first?  The  one  appeals  to  our  imagina- 
tion, and  may  be  helpful  to  it  in  its  own 
domain ;  but  the  other  directly  interests 
our  actual  life.  It  is  well  that  each  have 
its  share.  The  truth  that  is  undoubtedly 
truest  from  the  human  point  of  view  must 
evidently  appeal  to  us  more  than  the 
13? 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery- 
truth  which  is  truest  from  the  universal 
point  of  view.  Ignorant  as  we  are  of  the 
aim  of  the  universe,  how  shall  we  tell 
whether  or  no  it  concern  itself  with  the 
interests  of  our  race?  The  probable 
futility  of  our  life  and  our  species  is  a 
truth  which  regards  us  indirectly  only, 
and  may  well,  therefore,  be  left  in  sus- 
pense. The  other  truth,  that  indicates 
clearly  the  importance  of  life,  may  perhaps 
be  a  more  restricted  one,  but  it  has  a  direct, 
incontestable,  actual  bearing  upon  our- 
selves. To  sacrifice  or  even  subordinate 
it  to  an  alien  truth  must  surely  be  wrong. 
The  first  truth  should  never  be  lost  sight 
of;  it  will  strengthen  and  illumine  the 
second,  whose  government  will  thus  be- 
come more  intelligent  and  benign ;  the 
first  truth  will  teach  us  to  profit  by  all 
that  the  second  does  not  include.  And 
if  we  allow  it  to  sadden  our  heart  or  arrest 
our  action,  we  have  not  sufficiently  realised 
139  > 


The  Buried  Temple 

that  the  vast  but  precarious  space  it  fills 
in  the  region  of  important  truths  is 
governed  by  countless  problems  which  as 
yet  are  unsolved;  while  the  problems 
whereon  the  second  truth  rests  are  daily 
resolved  by  real  life.  The  first  truth  is  still 
in  the  dangerous,  feverish  stage  through 
which  all  truths  must  pass  before  they  can 
penetrate  freely  into  our  heart  and  our 
brain,  —  a  stage  of  jealousy,  truculence, 
which  renders  the  neighbourhood  of  an- 
other truth  insupportable  to  them.  We 
must  wait  till  the  fever  subsides ;  and  if 
the  home  that  we  have  prepared  in  our 
spirit  be  sufficiently  spacious  and  pure, 
we  shall  find  very  soon  that  the  most  con- 
tradictory truths  will  be  conscious  only  of 
the  mysterious  bond  that  unites  them,  and 
will  silently  join  with  each  other  to  place 
in  the  front  rank  of  all,  and  there  help 
and  sustain,  that  truth  from  among  them 
which  calmly  went  on  with  its  work  while 
X40 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

the  others  were  fretfully  jangling,  —  that 
truth  which  can  do  the  most  good,  and 
brings  with  it  the  uttermost  hope. 

[8] 

The  strangest  feature  of  the  present 
time  is  the  confusion  which  reigns  in  our 
instincts  and  feelings  —  in  our  ideas,  too, 
save  at  our  most  lucid,  most  tranquil, 
most  thoughtful  moments — on  the  sub- 
ject of  the  intervention  of  the  unknown 
or  mysterious  in  the  truly  grave  events 
of  life.  We  find,  amidst  this  confusion, 
feelings  which  no  longer  accord  with  any 
precise,  living,  accepted  idea;  such,  for 
instance,  as  concern  the  existence  of  a 
determinate  God,  conceived  as  more  or 
less  anthropomorphic,  providential,  per- 
sonal, and  unceasingly  vigilant.  We  find 
feelings  which,  as  yet,  are  only  partially 
ideas;  as  those  which  deal  with  fatality, 
destiny,  the  justice  of  things.  We  find 
I4« 


The  Buried  Temple 

ideas  which  will  soon  turn  to  feelings ; 
those  that  treat  of  the  law  of  the  species, 
evolution,  selection,  the  will-power  of  the 
race,  etc.  And  finally  we  discover  ideas 
which  still  are  purely  ideas,  too  uncertain 
and  scattered  for  us  to  be  able  to  predict 
at  what  moment  they  will  turn  into  feelings, 
and  thus  materially  influence  our  actions,  our 
acceptance  of  life,  our  joys  and  our  sorrows. 

[9] 

If  in  actual  life  this  confusion  is  not  so 
apparent,  it  is  only  because  actual  life  will 
but  rarely  express  itself,  or  condescend  to 
make  use  of  image  or  formula  to  relate  its 
experience.  This  state  of  mind,  however, 
is  clearly  discernible  in  all  those  whose 
self-imposed  mission  it  is  to  depict  real 
life,  to  explain  and  interpret  it,  and  throw 
light  on  the  hidden  causes  of  good  and 
evil  destiny.  It  is  of  the  poets  I  speak, 
of  dramatic  poets  above  all,  who  are  oc- 
14a 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

cupied  with  external  and  active  life;  and 
it  matters  not  whether  they  produce  novels, 
tragedies,  the  drama  properly  so  called,  or 
historical  studies,  for  I  give  to  the  words 
"  poets  "  and  "dramatic  poets  "  their  widest 
significance. 

It  cannot  be  denied  that  the  possession 
of  a  dominant  idea,  one  that  may  be  said 
to  exclude  all  others,  must  confer  consid- 
erable power  on  the  poet,  or  "interpreter 
of  life;"  and  in  the  degree  that  the  idea 
is  mysterious,  and  difficult  of  definition  or 
control,  will  be  the  extent  of  this  power 
and  its  conspicuousness  in  the  poem. 
And  this  is  entirely  legitimate,  so  long  as 
the  poet  himself  has  not  the  least  doubt 
as  to  the  value  of  his  idea;  and  there  are 
many  admirable  poets  who  have  never 
hesitated,  paused,  or  doubted.  Thus  it 
is  that  we  find  the  idea  of  heroic  duty  fill- 
ing so  enormous  a  space  in  the  tragedies 
of  Corneille,  that  of  absolute  faith  in  the 
H3 


The  Buried  Temple 

dramas  of  Calderon,  that  of  the  tyranny 
of  destiny  in  the  works  of  Sophocles. 

[lo] 

Of  these  three  ideas,  that  of  heroic  duty 
is  the  most  human  and  the  least  mysteri- 
ous ;  and  although  far  more  restricted 
to-day  than  at  the  time  of  Corneille,  —  for 
there  are  few  such  duties  which  it  would 
not  now  be  reasonable,  and  even  heroic, 
perhaps,  to  call  into  question,  and  it  be- 
comes ever  more  and  more  difficult  to 
find  one  that  is  truly  heroic,  —  conditions 
may  still  be  imagined  under  which  recourse 
thereto  may  be  legitimate  in  the  poet. 

But  will  he  discover  in  faith  —  to-day 
no  more  than  a  shadowy  memory  to  the 
most  fervent  believer  —  that  inspiration 
and  strength  by  whose  aid  Corneille  was 
able  to  depict  the  God  of  the  Christians 
as  the  august,  omnipresent  actor  of  his 
dramas,  invisible  but  untiringly  active, 
144 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

and  sovereign  always  ?  Or  is  it  possible 
still  for  a  reasonable  being,  whose  eyes 
rest  calmly  on  the  life  about  him,  to 
believe  in  the  tyranny  of  fate  ;  of  that 
sluggish,  unswerving,  preordained,  inscru- 
table force  which  urges  a  given  man,  or 
family,  by  given  ways  to  a  given  disaster 
or  death  ?  For  though  it  be  true  that 
our  life  is  subject  to  many  an  unknown 
force,  we  at  least  are  aware  that  these 
forces  would  seem  to  be  blind,  indifferent, 
unconscious,  and  that  their  most  insidious 
attacks  may  be  in  some  measure  averted 
by  the  wisest  among  us.  Can  we  still  be 
allowed,  then,  to  believe  that  the  universe 
holds  a  power  so  idle,  so  wretched,  as  to 
concern  itself  solely  in  saddening,  frustrat- 
ing, and  terrifying  the  projects  and  schemes 
of  man  ? 

Immanent  justice  is  another  mysterious 
and  sovereign  force,  whereof  use  has  been 
made ;  but  it  is  only  the  feeblest  of  writers 
lo  J4S 


The  Buried  Temple 

who  have  ventured  to  accept  this  postulate 
in  its  entirety,  —  only  those  to  whom  reality 
and  probability  were  matters  of  smallest 
moment.  The  affirmation  that  wicked- 
ness is  necessarily  and  visibly  punished 
in  this  life,  and  virtue  as  necessarily  and 
visibly  rewarded,  is  too  manifestly  opposed 
to  the  most  elementary  daily  experience, 
too  wildly  inconsistent  a  dream,  for  the 
true  poet  ever  to  accept  it  as  the  basis  of 
his  drama.  And,  on  the  other  hand,  if 
we  refer  to  a  future  life  the  bestowal  of 
reward  and  punishment,  we  are  merely 
entering  by  another  gate  the  region  of 
divine  justice.  For,  indeed,  unless  im- 
manent justice  be  infallible,  permanent, 
unvarying,  and  inevitable,  it  becomes  no 
more  than  a  curious,  well-meaning  caprice 
of  fate ;  and  from  that  moment  it  no 
longer  is  justice,  or  even  fate  ;  it  shrinks 
into  merest  chance  —  in  other  words, 
almost  into  nothingness. 
146 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

There  is,  it  is  true,  a  very  real  imma- 
nent justice ;  I  refer  to  the  force  which 
enacts  that  the  vicious,  malevolent,  cruel, 
disloyal  man  shall  be  morally  less  happy 
than  he  who  is  honest  and  good,  affection'^ 
ate,  gentle,  and  just.  But  here  it  is  in- 
ward justice  whose  workings  we  see ;  a 
very  human,  natural,  comprehensible  force, 
the  study  of  whose  cause  and  effect  must 
of  necessity  lead  to  psychological  drama, 
where  there  no  longer  is  need  of  the  vast 
and  mysterious  background  which  lent  its 
solemn  and  awful  perspective  to  the 
events  of  history  and  legend.  But  is  it 
legitimate  deliberately  to  misconceive  the 
unknown  that  governs  our  life  in  order 
that  we  may  reconstruct  this  mysterious 
background  ? 

["] 

While  on  this  subject  of  dominant  and 
mysterious  ideas,  we  shall  do  well  to  con- 
147 


The  Buried  Temple 

sider  the  forms  that  the  idea  of  fatality  has 
taken  and  for  ever  is  taking;  for  fatality 
even  to-day  still  provides  the  supreme 
explanation  for  all  that  we  cannot  ex- 
plain ;  and  it  is  to  fatality  still  that  the 
thoughts  of  the  "  interpreter  of  life " 
unceasingly  turn. 

The  poets  have  endeavoured  to  trans- 
form it,  to  make  it  attractive,  to  restore 
its  youth.  They  have  contrived,  in  their 
works,  a  hundred  new  and  winding  canals 
through  which  to  introduce  the  icy  waters 
of  the  great  and  desolate  river  whose 
banks  have  been  gradually  shunned  by 
the  dwellings  of  men.  And  of  those  most 
successful  in  making  us  share  the  illusion 
that  they  were  conferring  a  solemn,  defini- 
tive meaning  on  life,  there  are  few  who 
have  not  instinctively  recognised  the  sov- 
ereign importance  conferred  on  the  actions 
of  men  by  the  irresponsible  power  of  an 
ever  august  and  unerring  destiny.  Fatal- 
248 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

ity  would  seem  to  be  the  pre-eminent 
tragical  force  ;  it  no  sooner  appears  in 
a  drama  than  it  does  of  itself  three-fourths 
of  all  that  needs  doing.  It  may  safely  be 
said  that  the  poet  who  could  find  to-day, 
in  material  science,  in  the  unknown  that 
surrounds  us,  or  in  his  own  heart,  the 
equivalent  for  ancient  fatality  —  a  force, 
that  is,  of  equally  irresistible  predestina- 
tion, a  force  as  universally  admitted  — 
would  infallibly  produce  a  masterpiece. 
It  is  true,  however,  that  he  would  have, 
at  the  same  time,  to  solve  the  mighty 
enigma  for  whose  word  we  are  all  of  us 
seeking;  so  that  this  supposition  is  not 
likely  to  be  realised  very  soon. 

[12] 

This  is  the  source,  then,  whence  the 

lustral  water  is  drawn  with  which  the  poets 

have  purified   the  cruellest  of  tragedies. 

There  is  an  instinct  in  man  that  worships 

149 


The  Buried  Temple 

fatality,  and  he  is  apt  to  regard  whatever 
pertains  thereto  as  incontestable,  solemn, 
and  beautiful.  His  cry  is  for  freedom  ; 
but  circumstances  arise  when  he  rather 
would  tell  himself  that  he  is  not  free. 
The  unbending,  malignant  goddess  is  more 
acceptable  often  than  the  divinity  who 
only  asks  for  an  effort  that  shall  avert 
disaster.  All  things  notwithstanding,  it 
pleases  us  still  to  be  ruled  by  a  power  that 
nothing  can  turn  from  its  purpose ;  and 
whatever  our  mental  dignity  may  lose  by 
such  a  belief  is  gained  by  a  kind  of  senti- 
mental vanity  in  us,  which  complacently 
dwells  on  the  measureless  force  that  for 
ever  keeps  watch  on  our  plans,  and  con- 
fers on  our  simplest  action  a  mysterious, 
eternal  significance.  Fatality,  briefly,  ex- 
plains and  excuses  all  things,  by  relegating 
to  a  sufficient  distance  in  the  invisible  or 
the  unintelligible  all  that  it  would  be  hard 
to  explain  and  more  difficult  still  to  excuse. 
150 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

[13] 

Therefore  it  is  that  so  many  have  turned 
to  the  dismembered  statue  of  the  terrible 
goddess  who  reigned  in  the  dramas  of 
Euripides,  Sophocles,  and  iEschylus,  and 
that  the  scattered  fragments  of  her  limbs 
have  provided  more  than  one  poet  with 
the  marble  required  for  the  fashioning  of 
a  newer  divinity,,  who  should  be  more 
human,  less  arbitrary,  and  less  incon- 
ceivable than  she  of  old.  The  fatality 
of  the  passions,  for  instance,  has  thus 
been  evolved.  But  for  a  passion  truly  to 
be  fatal  in  a  soul  aware  of  itself,  for  the 
mystery  to  reappear  that  shall  make  crime 
pardonable  by  investing  it  with  loftiness 
and  lifting  it  high  above  the  will  of  man, 
—  for  these  we  require  the  intervention  of 
a  God,  or  some  other  equally  irresistible, 
infinite  force.  Wagner,  therefore,  in  'Tris- 
tram and  Iseulty  makes  use  of  the  philtre. 


The  Buried  Temple 

as  Shakespeare  of  the  witches  in  Macbethy 
Racine  of  the  oracle  of  Calchas  in  Iphigeniay 
and  of  Venus'  hatred  in  Phedre.  We  have 
travelled  in  a  circle,  and  find  ourselves 
back  once  more  at  the  very  heart  of  the 
craving  of  former  days.  This  expedient 
may  be  more  or  less  legitimate  in  archaic 
or  legendary  drama,  where  there  is  room 
for  all  kinds  of  poetic  fantasy ;  but  in  the 
drama  which  pretends  to  actual  truth 
we  demand  another  intervention,  one  that 
shall  seem  to  us  more  genuinely  irresistible, 
if  crimes  like  Macbeth's,  such  a  deed  of 
horror  as  that  to  which  Agamemnon  con- 
sented :  perhaps,  too,  the  kind  of  love  that 
burned  in  Phedre,  shall  achieve  their  mys- 
terious excuse,  and  acquire  a  grandeur 
and  sombre  nobility  that  intrinsically  they 
do  not  possess.  Take  away  from  Mac- 
beth the  fatal  predestination,  the  interven- 
tion of  Hell,  the  heroic  struggle  with  an 
occult  justice  that  for  ever  is  revealing 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

itself  through  a  thousand  fissures  of 
revolting  nature,  and  Macbeth  is  merely 
a  frantic,  contemptible  murderer.  Take 
away  the  oracle  of  Calchas,  and  Agamem- 
non becomes  abominable.  Take  away  the 
hatred  of  Venus,  and  what  is  Phedre  but 
a  neurotic  creature,  whose  "  moral  quality  " 
and  power  of  resistance  to  evil  are  too 
pronouncedly  feeble  for  our  intellect  to 
take  any  genuine  interest  in  the  calamity 
that  befalls  her? 

[14] 

Truly,  these  supernatural  interventions 
to-day  satisfy  neither  spectator  nor  reader. 
Though  he  know  it  not,  perhaps,  and 
strive  as  he  may,  it  is  no  longer  possible 
for  him  to  regard  them  seriously  in  the 
depths  of  his  consciousness.  His  con^ 
ception  of  the  universe  is  other.  He  no 
longer  detects  the  working  of  a  narrow, 
determined,  obstinate,  violent  will  in  the 
'S3 


The  Buried  Temple 

multitude  of  forces  that  strive  in  him  and 
about  him.  He  knows  that  the  criminal 
whom  he  may  meet  in  actual  life  has  been 
urged  into  crime  by  misfortune,  educa- 
tion, atavism,  or  by  movements  of  passion 
which  he  has  himself  experienced  and  sub- 
dued, while  recognising  that  there  might 
have  been  circumstances  under  which 
their  repression  would  have  been  a  matter 
of  exceeding  difficulty.  He  will  not,  it  is 
true,  always  be  able  to  discover  the  cause 
of  these  misfortunes,  or  of  these  move- 
ments of  passion  ;  and  his  endeavour  to 
account  for  the  injustice  of  education  or 
heredity  will  probably  be  no  less  unsuc- 
cessful. But  for  all  that  he  will  no  longer 
incline  to  attribute  a  particular  crime  to 
the  wrath  of  a  God,  the  direct  interven- 
tion of  Hell,  or  to  a  series  of  changeless 
decrees  inscribed  in  the  book  of  fate. 
Why  ask  of  him,  then,  to  accept  in  a 
poem  an  explanation  which  he  refuses  in 
»S4 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

life  ?  Is  the  poet's  duty  not  rather  to  fur- 
nish an  explanation  loftier,  clearer,  more 
widely  and  profoundly  human,  than  any 
his  reader  can  find  for  himself?  For,  in- 
deed, this  wrath  of  the  gods,  intervention 
of  Hell,  and  writing  in  letters  of  fire,  are 
to  him  no  more  to-day  than  so  many 
symbols  that  have  long  ceased  to  content 
him.  It  is  time  that  the  poet  should 
realise  that  the  symbol  is  legitimate  only 
when  it  stands  for  accepted  truth,  or  for 
truth  which  as  yet  we  cannot,  or  will  not, 
accept ;  but  the  symbol  is  out  of  place  at 
a  time  when  it  is  truth  itself  that  we  seek. 
And  besides,  to  merit  admission  into  a 
really  living  poem,  the  symbol  should  be 
at  least  as  great  and  beautiful  as  the  truth 
for  which  it  stands,  and  should,  more- 
over, precede  this  truth,  and  not  follow  a 
long  way  behind. 


^S5 


The  Buried  Temple 

[•5] 

We  see,  therefore,  how  surpassingly 
difficult  it  must  have  become  to  introduce 
great  crimes,  or  cruel,  unbridled,  tragical, 
passions  into  a  modern  work,  above  all 
if  that  work  be  destined  for  stage  pres- 
entation; for  the  poet  will  seek  in  vain 
for  the  mysterious  excuse  these  crimes  or 
passions  demand.  And  yet,  for  all  that, 
so  deeply  is  this  craving  for  mysterious 
excuse  implanted  within  us,  so  satisfied 
are  we  that  man  is,  at  bottom,  never  as 
guilty  as  he  may  appear,  that  we  are 
still  fully  content,  when  considering  pas- 
sions or  crimes  of  this  nature,  to  admit 
some  kind  of  fatal  intervention  that  at 
least  may  not  seem  too  manifestly  un- 
acceptable. 

This  excuse,  however,  will  be  sought 
by  us  only  when  the  persons  guilty  of 
crimes  which  are  contrary  to  human  na- 
156 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

ture,  then  the  victims  of  misfortunes  which 
they  could  not  foresee,  which  seem  unde- 
served to  us,  inexplicable,  wholly  abnor- 
mal, are  more  or  less  superior  beings, 
possessed  of  their  fullest  share  of  con- 
sciousness. We  are  loath  to  admit  that  an 
extraordinary  crime  or  disaster  can  have  a 
purely  human  cause.  In  spite  of  all,  we 
persistently  seek  in  some  way  to  explain 
the  inexplicable.  We  should  not  be  satis- 
fied if  the  poet  were  simply  to  say  to  us  : 
**  You  see  here  the  wrong  that  was  done 
by  this  strong,  this  conscious,  intelligent 
man.  Behold  the  misfortune  this  hero 
encountered ;  this  good  man's  ruin  and 
sorrow.  See,  too,  how  this  sage  is  crushed 
by  tragic,  irremediable  wickedness.  The 
human  causes  of  these  events  are  evident 
to  you.  I  have  no  other  explanation  to 
offer,  unless  it  be  perhaps  the  indifference 
of  the  universe  towards  the  actions  of 
man."  Our  dissatisfaction  would  vanish  if 
157 


The  Buried  Temple 

he  could  succeed  in  conveying  to  us  the 
sensation  of  this  indifference,  if  he  could 
show  it  in  action ;  but,  as  it  is  the  prop- 
erty of  indifference  never  to  interfere  or 
act,  that  would  seem  to  be  more  or  less 
unachievable. 

[i6] 

But  when  we  turn  to  the  by  no  means 
inevitable  jealousy  of  Othello,  or  to  the 
misfortunes  of  Romeo  and  Juliet,  which 
were  surely  not  preordained,  we  discover 
no  need  of  explanation,  or  of  the  purifying 
influence  of  fatality.  In  another  drama. 
Ford's  masterpiece,  *'Tis  Pity  She*s  a 
Whore,  which  revolves  around  the  incest- 
uous love  of  Giovanni  for  his  sister 
Annabella,  we  are  compelled  either  to 
turn  away  in  horror,  or  to  seek  the  mys- 
terious excuse  in  its  habitual  haunt  on  the 
shore  of  the  gulf.  But  even  here,  the  first 
painful  shock  over,  we  find  it  is  not  im- 
158 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

perative.  For  the  love  of  brother  for  sis- 
ter, viewed  from  a  standpoint  sufficiently 
lofty,  is  a  crime  against  morality,  but  not 
against  human  nature ;  and  there  is  at 
least  some  measure  of  palliation  in  the 
youth  of  the  pair,  and  in  the  passion  that 
blinds  them.  Othello,  too,  the  semi-bar- 
barian who  does  Desdemona  to  death,  has 
been  goaded  to  madness  by  the  machina- 
tions of  I  ago  ;  and  even  this  last  can  plead 
his  by  no  means  gratuitous  hatred.  The 
disasters  that  weighed  so  heavily  on  the 
lovers  of  Verona  were  due  to  the  inexpe- 
rience of  the  victims,  to  the  manifest  dispro- 
portion between  their  strength  and  that  of 
their  enemies  ;  and  although  we  may  pity 
the  man  who  succumbs  to  superior  human 
force,  his  downfall  does  not  surprise  us. 
We  are  not  impelled  to  seek  explanation 
elsewhere,  to  ask  questions  of  fate ;  and 
unless  he  appear  to  fall  victim  to  super- 
human injustice  we  are  content  to  tell  our- 
159 


The  Buried  Temple 

selves  that  what  has  happened  was  bound 
to  happen.  It  is  only  when  disaster  oc- 
curs after  every  precaution  is  taken  that 
we  could  ourselves  have  devised,  that  we 
become  conscious  of  the  need  for  other 
explanation. 

[•7] 
We  find  it  difficult,  therefore,  to  con- 
ceive or  admit  as  naturally,  humanly  pos- 
sible that  a  crime  shall  be  committed  by  a 
person  who  apparently  is  endowed  with 
fullest  intelligence  and  consciousness ;  or 
that  misfortune  should  befall  him  which 
seems  in  its  essence  to  be  inexplicable, 
undeserved,  and  unexpected.  It  follows, 
therefore,  that  the  poet  can  only  place  on 
the  stage  (this  phrase  I  use  merely  as  an 
abbreviation  :  it  would  be  more  correct  to 
say,  "  cause  us  to  assist  at  some  adven- 
ture whereof  we  know  personally  neither 
the  actors  nor  the  totality  of  the  circum- 
i6o 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery- 
stances  ")  faults,  crimes,  and  acts  of 
injustice  committed  by  persons  of  defec- 
tive consciousness,  as  also  disasters  befall- 
ing feeble  beings  unable  to  control  their 
desires  —  innocent  creatures,  it  may  be, 
but  thick-sighted,  imprudent,  and  reck- 
less. Under  these  conditions  there  would 
seem  to  be  no  call  for  the  intervention  of 
anything  beyond  the  limit  of  normal  hu- 
man psychology.  But  such  a  conception 
of  the  theatre  would  be  at  absolute  vari- 
ance with  real  life,  where  we  find  crimes 
committed  by  persons  of  fullest  conscious- 
ness, and  the  most  inexplicable,  inconceiv- 
able, unmerited  misfortunes  befalling  the 
wisest,  the  best,  most  virtuous  and  prudent 
of  men.  Dramas  which  deal  with  uncon- 
scious creatures,  whom  their  own  feebleness 
oppresses  and  their  own  desires  overcome, 
excite  our  interest,  and  arouse  our  pity ; 
but  the  veritable  drama,  the  one  which 
probes  to  the  heart  of  things  and  grapples 
II  i6i 


The  Buried  Temple 

with  important  truths,  —  our  own  personal 
drama,  in  a  word,  which  forever  hangs 
over  our  life,  —  is  the  one  wherein  the 
strong,  intelligent,  and  conscious  commit 
errors,  faults,  and  crimes  which  are  almost 
inevitable ;  wherein  the  wise  and  upright 
struggle  with  all-powerful  calamity,  with 
forces  destructive  to  wisdom  and  virtue ; 
for  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  the  spectator, 
however  feeble,  dishonest  even,  he  may  be 
in  real  life,  still  enrols  himself  always 
among  the  virtuous, just,  and  strong;  and 
when  he  reflects  on  the  misfortunes  of  the 
weak,  or  even  witnesses  them,  he  reso- 
lutely declines  to  imagine  himself  in  the 
place  of  the  victims. 

[.8] 

Here  we  attain  the  limit  of  the  human 
will,   the   gloomy    boundary-line   of  the 
influence    that    the    most  just    and   en- 
lightened   of  men   is    able    to   exert   on 
162 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery- 
events  that  decide  his  future  happiness  or 
sorrow.  No  great  drama  exists,  or  poem 
of  lofty  aim,  but  one  of  its  heroes  shall 
stray  to  this  frontier  where  his  destiny 
waits  for  the  seal.  Why  has  this  wise, 
this  virtuous  man  committed  this  fault  or 
this  crime  ?  Why  has  that  woman,  who 
knows  so  well  the  meaning  of  all  that  she 
does,  hazarded  the  gesture  which  must 
so  inevitably  summon  everlasting  sorrow? 
By  whom  have  theiinks  been  forged  of 
the  chain  of  disaster  whose  fetters  have 
crushed  this  innocent  family  ?  Why  do 
all  things  crumble  around  one,  and  fall 
into  ruins,  while  the  other,  his  neighbour, 
less  active  and  strong,  less  skilful  and  wise, 
find  ever  material  by  him  to  build  up  his  life 
anew  ?  Why  do  tenderness,  beauty,  and 
love  flock  to  the  path  of  some,  where  others 
meet  hatred  only,  and  malice,  and  treach- 
ery ?  Why  persistent  happiness  here, 
and  yonder,  though  merits  be  equal, 
163 


The  Buried  Temple 

nought  but  unceasing  disaster  ?  "Why  is 
this  house  for  ever  beset  with  the  storm, 
while  over  that  other  shines  the  peace  of 
unvarying  stars  ?  Why  genius,  and  riches, 
and  heahh  on  this  side,  and  yonder  dis- 
ease, imbecility,  poverty  ?  Whence  has 
the  passion  been  sent  that  has  wrought 
such  terrible  grief,  and  whence  the  passion 
that  proved  the  source  of  such  wonderful 
joy  ?  Why  does  the  youth  whom  yester- 
day I  met  go  on  his  tranquil  road  to  pro- 
foundest  happiness,  while  his  friend,  with 
the  same  methodical,  peaceful,  ignorant 
step,  proceeds  on  his  way  to  death  ? 

[>9] 

Life  will  often  place  these  problems  be- 
fore us  ;  but  how  rarely  are  we  compelled 
to  refer  their  solution  to  the  supernatural, 
mysterious,  superhuman,  or  preordained  ! 
It  is  only  the  fervent  believer  who  will 
still  be  content  to  see  there  the  finger  of 
164 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery- 
divine  intervention.  Such  of  us,  how- 
ever, as  have  entered  the  house  where  the 
storm  has  raged,  as  well  as  the  house  of 
peace,  have  rarely  issued  from  them  with- 
out most  clearly  detecting  the  essentially 
human  reasons  of  both  peace  and  storm. 
We  who  have  known  the  wise  and  up- 
right man  who  has  been  guilty  of  error  or 
crime,  are  acquainted  also  with  the  cir- 
cumstances also  which  induced  his  ac- 
tion, and  these  circumstances  seem  to  us 
in  no  way  supernatural.  As  we  draw 
near  to  the  woman  whose  gesture  brought 
misery  to  her,  we  learn  very  soon  that  this 
gesture  might  have  been  avoided,  and 
that,  in  her  place,  we  should  have  re- 
frained. The  friends  of  the  man  around 
whom  all  fell  into  ruins,  and  of  the  neigh- 
bour who  ever  was  able  to  build  up  his 
life  anew,  will  have  observed  before  that 
the  acorn  sometimes  will  fall  on  to  rock, 
and  sometimes  on  fertile  soil.  And 
'65 


The  Buried  Temple 

though  poverty,  sickness  and  death  re- 
main still  the  three  inequitable  goddesses 
of  human  existence,  they  no  longer  awake 
in  us  the  superstitious  fears  of  bygone 
days.  We  regard  them  to-day  as  essen- 
tially indifferent,  unconscious,  blind.  We 
know  that  they  recognise  none  of  the 
ideal  laws  which  we  once  believed  that 
they  sanctioned ;  and  it  only  too  often 
has  happened  that,  at  the  very  moment 
we  were  whispering  to  ourselves  of  "  puri- 
fication, trial,  reward,  punishment,"  their 
undiscerning  caprice  gave  the  lie  to  the 
too  lofty,  too  moral  tide  which  we  were 
about  to  bestow. 

[ao] 

Our  imagination,  it  is  true,  is  inclined 
to  admit,  perhaps  to  desire,  the  interven- 
tion of  the  superhuman  ;  but,  for  all  that, 
there  are  few,  even  among  the  most 
mystic,  who  are  not  convinced  that  our 
i66 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

moral  misfortunes  are,  in  their  essence,  de- 
termined by  our  mind  and  our  character  ; 
and  similarly,  that  our  physical  misfor- 
tunes are  due  in  part  to  the  workings  of 
certain  forces  which  often  are  misunder- 
stood, and  in  part  to  the  generally  ill- 
defined  relation  of  cause  to  effect ;  nor  is 
it  unreasonable  to  hope  that  light  may  bf 
thrown  on  these  problems  as  we  penetrate 
further  into  the  secrets  of  nature.  We 
have  here  a  certitude  upon  which  our 
whole  life  depends  ;  a  certitude  which  is 
shaken  only  when  we  consider  our  own 
misfortunes,  for  then  we  shrink  from 
analysing  or  admitting  the  faults  we  our- 
selves have  committed.  There  is  a 
hopefulness  in  man  which  renders  him 
unwilling  to  grant  that  the  cause  of  his 
misfortune  may  be  as  transparent  as  that 
of  the  wave  which  dies  away  in  the  sand 
or  is  hurled  on  the  cHif,  of  the  insect 
whose  Httle  wings  gleam  for  an  instant  in 
167 


The  Buried  Temple 

the  light  of  the  sun  till  the  passing  bird 
absorbs  its  existence. 

[21] 

Let  me  suppose  that  a  neighbour  of 
mine,  whom  I  know  very  intimately, 
whose  regular  habits  and  inoffensive 
manners  have  won  my  esteem,  should  suc- 
cessively lose  his  wife  in  a  railway  acci- 
dent, one  son  at  sea,  another  in  a  fire,  the 
third  and  last  by  disease.  I  should,  of 
course,  be  painfully  shocked  and  grieved ; 
but  still  it  would  not  occur  to  me  to 
attribute  this  series  of  disasters  to  a 
divine  vengeance  or  an  invisible  justice, 
to  a  strange,  ill-starred  predestination,  or 
an  active,  persistent,  inevitable  fatality. 
My  thoughts  would  fly  to  the  myriad 
unfortunate  hazards  of  life ;  I  should  be 
appalled  at  the  frightful  coincidence  of 
calamity ;  but  in  me  there  would  be  no 
suggestion  of  a  superhuman  will  that  had 
1 68 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery- 
hurled  the  train  over  the  precipice,  steered 
the  ship  on  to  rocks,  or  kindled  the 
flames  ;  I  should  hold  it  incredible  that 
such  monstrous  efforts  could  have  been 
put  forth  with  the  sole  object  of  inflicting 
punishment  and  despair  upon  a  poor 
wretch,  because  of  some  error  he  might 
have  committed  —  one  of  those  grave  hu- 
man errors  which  yet  are  so  petty  in  face 
of  the  universe  ;  an  error  which  perhaps 
had  not  issued  from  either  his  heart  or 
his  brain,  and  had  stirred  not  one  blade 
of  grass  on  the  earth's  whole  surface. 

[ "  ] 

But  he,  this  neighbour  of  mine,  on 
whom  these  terrible  blows  have  suc- 
cessively fallen  like  so  many  lightning- 
flashes  on  a  black  night  of  storm  —  will 
he  think  as  I  do,  will  these  catastrophes 
seem  natural  to  him,  and  ordinary,  and 
susceptible  of  explanation  ?  Will  not  the 
169 


The  Buried  Temple 

words  destiny,  fortune,  hazard,  ill-luck, 
fatality,  star  —  the  word  Providence,  per- 
haps— assume  in  his  mind  a  significance 
they  never  have  assumed  before?  Will 
not  the  light  beneath  which  he  questions 
his  consciousness  be  a  different  light  from 
my  own;  will  he  not  feel  round  his  life 
an  influence,  a  power,  a  kind  of  evil  inten- 
tion, that  are  imperceptible  to  me?  And 
who  is  right,  he  or  I  ?  Which  of  us  two 
sees  more  clearly,  and  further  ?  Do  truths 
that  in  calmer  times  lie  hidden  float  to  the 
surface  in  hours  of  trouble;  and  which  is 
the  moment  we  should  choose  to  establish 
the  meaning  of  life  ? 

The  "  interpreter  of  life,"  as  a  rule, 
selects  the  troubled  hours.  He  places 
himself,  and  us,  in  the  soul-state  of  his 
victims.  He  shows  their  misfortunes  to 
us  in  perspective  ;  and  so  sharply,  con- 
cretely, that  we  have  for  the  moment  the 
illusion  of  a  personal  disaster.  And, 
170 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

indeed,  it  is  more  or  less  impossible  for 
him  to  depict  them  as  they  would  occur 
in  real  life.  If  we  had  spent  long  years 
with  the  hero  of  the  drama  which  has 
stirred  us  so  painfully,  had  he  been  our 
brother,  our  father,  our  friend;  we  should 
probably  have  noted,  recognised,  counted 
one  by  one  as  they  passed,  all  the  causes 
of  his  misfortune,  which  then  would  not 
only  appear  less  extraordinary  to  us,  but 
perfectly  natural  even,  and  humanly  al- 
most inevitable.  But  to  the  "  interpreter 
of  life  "  is  given  neither  power  nor  occa- 
sion to  acquaint  us  with  each  veritable 
cause.  For  these  causes,  as  a  rule,  are 
infinitely  slow  in  their  movement,  and 
countless  in  number,  and  slight,  and  of 
small  apparent  significance.  He  is  there- 
fore led  to  adopt  a  general  cause,  one 
sufficiently  vast  to  embrace  the  whole 
drama,  in  place  of  the  real  and  human 
causes  which  he  is  unable  to  show  us,  un- 
171 


The  Buried  Temple 

able,  too,  himself  to  examine  and  study. 
And  where  shall  a  general  cause  of  suf- 
ficient vastness  be  found,  if  not  in  the 
two  or  three  words  we  breathe  to  our- 
selves when  silence  oppresses  us:  words 
like  fatality,  divinity.  Providence,  or  ob- 
scure and  nameless  justice? 

The  question  before  us  now  Is  how 
far  this  procedure  can  be  beneficial,  or 
even  legitimate ;  as  also  whether  it  be 
the  mission  of  the  poet  to  present,  and 
insist  on,  the  distress  and  confusion  of 
our  least  lucid  hours,  or  to  add  to  the 
clearsightedness  of  the  moments  when  we 
conceive  ourselves  to  enjoy  the  fullest 
possession  of  our  force  and  our  reason. 
In  our  own  misfortunes  there  is  some- 
thing of  good,  and  something  of  good 
must  therefore  be  found  in  the  illusion  of 
personal  misfortune.  We  are  made  to 
172 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

look  into  ourselves  ;  our  errors,  our  weak- 
nesses, are  more  clearly  revealed  ;  it  is 
shown  to  us  where  we  have  strayed. 
There  falls  a  light  on  our  consciousness 
a  thousand  times  more  searching,  more 
active,  than  could  spring  from  many 
arduous  years  of  meditation  and  study. 
We  are  forced  to  emerge  from  ourselves, 
and  to  let  our  eyes  rest  on  those  round 
about  us ;  we  are  rendered  more  keenly 
alive  to  the  sorrows  of  others.  There  are 
some  who  will  tell  us  that  misfortune 
does  even  more,  —  that  it  urges  our  glance 
on  high,  and  compels  us  to  bow  to  a 
power  superior  to  our  own,  to  an  unseen 
justice,  to  an  impenetrable,  infinite  mys- 
tery. Can  this  indeed  be  the  best  of  all 
possible  issues  ?  Ah,  yes,  it  was  well, 
from  the  standpoint  of  religious  morality, 
that  misfortune  should  teach  us  to  lift  up 
our  eyes  and  look  on  an  eternal,  unchang- 
ing, undeniable  God,  sovereignly  beauti- 
173 


The  Buried  Temple 

ful,  sovereignly  just,  and  sovereignly  good. 
It  was  well  that  the  poet  who  found  in  his 
God  an  unquestionable  ideal  should  inces- 
santly hold  before  us  this  unique,  this  de- 
finitive ideal.  But  to-day,  if  we  look 
away  from  the  truth,  from  the  ordinary 
experience  of  life,  on  what  shall  our 
eager  glance  rest?  If  we  discard  the 
more  or  less  compensatory  laws  of  con- 
science and  inward  happiness,  what  shall 
we  say  when  triumphant  injustice  con- 
fronts us,  or  successful,  unpunished  crime? 
How  shall  we  account  for  the  death  of  a 
child,  the  miserable  end  of  an  innocent 
man,  or  the  disaster  hurled  by  cruel  fate 
on  some  unfortunate  creature,  if  we  seek 
explanations  loftier,  more  definite,  more 
comprehensive  and  decisive  than  those 
that  are  found  satisfactory  in  every-day 
life,  for  the  reason  that  they  are  the  only 
ones  that  accord  with  a  certain  number  of 
realities  ?  Is  it  right  that  the  poet,  in  his 
174 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery- 
eager  desire  to  contrive  a  solemn  atmo- 
sphere for  his  drama,  should  arouse  from 
their  slumber  sentiments,  errors,  prejudices, 
and  fears,  which  we  would  attack  and  rebuke 
were  we  to  discover  them  in  the  hearts  of 
our  friends  or  our  children?  Man  has  at 
last,  through  his  study  of  the  habits  of 
spirit  and  brain,  of  the  laws  of  existence, 
the  caprices  of  fate,  and  the  maternal  in- 
difference, of  nature  —  man  has  at  last, 
and  laboriously,  acquired  some  few  certi- 
tudes, that  are  worthy  of  all  respect; 
and  is  the  poet  entitled  to  seize  on  the 
moment  of  anguish  in  order  to  oust  all 
these  certitudes,  and  set  up  in  their  place 
a  fatality  to  which  every  action  of  ours 
gives  the  lie,  or  powers  before  which  we 
would  refuse  to  kneel  did  the  blow  fall  on 
us  that  has  prostrated  his  hero ;  or  a 
mystic  justice  that,  for  all  it  may  sweep 
away  the  need  for  many  an  embarrassing 
explanation,  bears  yet  not  the  slightest 
175 


\ 


The  Buried  Temple 

kinship  to  the  active  and  personal  justice 
we  all  of  us  recognise  in  our  own  per- 
sonal life? 

And  yet  this  is  what  the  "  interpreter 
of  life  "  will  more  or  less  deliberately  do 
from  the  moment  he  seeks  to  invest  his 
work  with  a  lofty  spirit,  with  a  deep  and 
religious  beauty,  with  the  sense  of  the 
infinite.  Even  though  this  work  of  his 
may  be  of  the  sincerest,  though  it  express 
as  nearly  as  may  be  his  own  most  intimate 
truth,  he  believes  that  this  truth  is 
enhanced,  and  established  more  firmly, 
by  being  surrounded  with  phantoms  of  a 
forgotten  past.  Might  not  the  symbols 
he  needs,  the  hypotheses,  images,  the 
touchstone  for  all  that  cannot  be  explained, 
be  less  frequently  sought  in  that  which  he 
knows  is  not  true,  and  more  often  in  that 
which  will  one  day  be  a  truth  ?  Does 
176 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

the  unearthing  of  bygone  terrors,  or  the 
borrowing  of  light  from  a  Hell  that  has 
ceased  to  be,  make  death  more  sublime  ? 
Does  dependence  on  a  supreme  but  im- 
aginary will  ennoble  our  destiny  ?  Does 
justice  —  that  vast  network  woven  by 
human  action  and  reaction  over  the  un- 
changing wisdom  of  nature's  moral  and 
physical  forces  —  does  justice  become  more 
majestic  through  being  lodged  in  the 
hands  of  a  unique  judge,  whom  the  very 
spirit  of  the  drama  dethrones  and  destroys  ? 

Let  us  ask  ourselves  whether  the  hour 
may  not  have  come  for  the  earnest  revi- 
sion of  the  symbols,  the  images,  senti- 
ments, beauty,  wherewith  we  still  seek  to 
glorify  in  us  the  spectacle  of  the  world. 

This  beauty,  these  feelings  and  senti- 
ments, to-day  unquestionably  bear    only 

the  most  distant  relation  to  the  phenom- 
la  177 


The  Buried  Temple 

ena,  thoughts,  nay  even  the  dreams,  of 
our  actual  existence ;  and  if  they  are  suf- 
fered still  to  abide  with  us,  it  is  rather  as 
tender  and  innocent  memories  of  a  past 
that  was  more  credulous,  and  nearer  to 
the  childhood  of  man.  Were  it  not  well, 
then,  that  those  whose  mission  it  is  to 
make  more  evident  to  us  the  beauty  and 
harmony  of  the  world  we  live  in,  should 
march  ever  onwards  and  let  their  steps 
tend  to  the  actual  truth  of  this  world? 
Their  conception  of  the  universe  need  not 
be  stripped  of  a  single  one  of  the  orna- 
ments wherewith  they  embellish  it ;  but 
why  seek  these  ornaments  so  often  among 
mere  recollections,  however  smiling  or 
terrible,  and  so  seldom  from  among  the 
essential  thoughts  which  have  helped  them 
to  build,  and  effectively  organise,  their 
spiritual  and  sentient  life  ? 

It  can  never  be  right  to  dwell  in  the 
midst  of  false  images,  even  though  these 
178 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

are  known  to  be  false.  The  time  will 
come  when  the  illusory  image  will  usurp 
the  place  of  the  just  idea  it  has  seemed  to 
represent.  We  shall  not  reduce  the  part 
of  the  infinite  and  the  mysterious  by  em- 
ploying other  images,  by  framing  other 
and  juster  conceptions.  Do  what  we  may, 
this  part  can  never  be  lessened.  It  will 
always  be  found  deep  down  in  the  heart 
of  men,  at  the  root  of  each  problem,  per- 
vading the  universe.  And  for  all  that 
the  substance,  the  place  of  these  mysteries, 
may  seem  to  have  changed,  their  extent 
and  power  remain  for  ever  the  same. 
Has  not  —  to  take  but  one  instance  — 
has  not  the  phenomenon  of  the  exist- 
ence, everywhere  among  us,  of  a  kind  of 
supreme  and  wholly  spiritual  justice,  un- 
armed, unadorned,  unequipped,  moving 
slowly  but  never  swerving,  remaining  stable 
and  changeless  in  a  world  where  injustice 
would  seem  to  reign  —  has  this  phenom- 
179 


The  Buried  Temple 

enon  not  cause  and  effect  as  deep,  as 
exhaustless  —  is  it  not  as  astounding,  as 
admirable  —  as  the  wisdom  of  an  eternal 
and  omnipresent  Judge?  Should  this 
Judge  be  held  more  convincing  for  that  he 
is  less  conceivable?  Are  fewer  sources 
of  beauty,  or  occasions  for  genius  to 
exercise  insight  and  power,  to  be  found 
in  what  can  be  explained  than  in  what 
is,  a  priori,  inexplicable  ?  Does  not,  for 
instance,  a  victorious  but  unjust  war  (such 
as  those  of  the  Romans,  of  England  to- 
day, the  conquests  of  Spain  in  America, 
etc.)  in  the  end  always  demoralise  the 
victor  and  thrust  upon  him  errors,  faults, 
and  habits  whereby  he  is  made  to  pay 
dearly  for  his  triumph ;  and  is  not  the 
minute,  the  relentless  labour  of  this  psy- 
chological justice  as  absorbing,  as  vast, 
as  the  intervention  of  a  superhuman  jus- 
tice ?  And  may  not  the  same  be  said  of 
the  justice  that  lives  in  each  one  of  us, 
i8o 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

that  causes  the  space  left  for  peace,  inner 
happiness,  love,  to  expand  or  contract  in 
our  mind  and  our  heart  in  conformity 
with  our  striving  towards  that  which  is 
just  or  unjust? 

[26] 

And  to  turn  to  one  mystery  more,  the 
most  awful  of  all,  that  of  death  —  would 
anyone  pretend  that  our  perception  of 
justice,  of  goodness  and  beauty,  or  our 
intellectual,  sentient  power,  our  eagerness 
for  all  that  draws  near  to  the  infinite,  all^ 
powerful,  eternal,  has  dwindled  since  death 
has  finally  ceased  to  be  held  the  immense 
and  exclusive  anguish  of  life  ?  Does  not 
each  new  generation  find  the  burden  lighter 
to  bear  as  the  forms  of  death  grow  less 
violent  and  its  posthumous  terrors  fade  ? 
It  is  the  illness  that  goes  before,  the 
physical  pain,  of  which  we  are  to-day  most 
afraid.  But  death  is  no  longer  the  hour 
181 


The  Buried  Temple 

of  the  wrathful,  inscrutable  judge ;  no 
longer  the  one  and  the  terrible  goal,  the 
gulf  of  misery  and  eternal  punishment. 
It  is  slowly  becoming  —  indeed,  in  some 
cases,  it  has  already  become  —  the  wished- 
for  repose  of  a  life  that  draws  to  its  end. 
Its  weight  no  longer  oppresses  each  one 
of  our  actions  ;  and,  above  all  —  for  this 
is  the  most  striking  change  —  it  has  ceased 
to  intrude  itself  into  our  morality.  And 
is  this  morality  of  ours  less  lofty,  less  pure, 
less  profound,  because  of  the  disinterested- 
ness it  has  thus  acquired  ?  Has  the  loss 
of  an  overwhelming  dread  robbed  man- 
kind of  a  single  precious,  indispensable 
feeling  ?  And  must  not  life  itself  find 
gain  in  the  importance  wrested  from  death  ? 
Surely ;  for  the  neutral  forces  that  we 
hold  in  reserve  within  us  are  waiting  and 
ready  ;  and  every  discouragement,  sorrow, 
or  fear  that  departs  has  its  place  quickly 
filled  by  a  certitude,  admiration,  or  hope. 
182 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

[27] 
The  poet  is  inclined  to  personify  fatality 
and  justice,  and  give  outward  form  to 
forces  really  within  us,  for  the  reason  that 
to  show  them  at  work  in  ourselves  is  a 
matter  of  exceeding  difficulty  ;  and  further, 
that  the  unknown  and  the  infinite,  to  the 
extent  that  they  are  unknown  and  infinite, 
/.  ^.,  lacking  personality,  intelligence,  and 
morality,  are  powerless  to  move  us.  And 
here  it  is  curious  to  note  that  we  are  in 
no  degree  affected  by  material  mystery, 
however  dangerous  or  obscure,  or  by 
psychological  justice,  however  involved 
its  results.  It  is  not  the  incomprehen- 
sible in  nature  that  masters  and  crushes 
us,  but  the  thought  that  nature  may  pos- 
sibly be  governed  by  a  conscious,  superior, 
reasoning  will  :  one  that,  although  super- 
human, has  yet  some  kinship  to  the  will 
of  man.  What  we  dread,  in  a  word,  is 
183 


The  Buried  Temple 

the  presence  of  a  God ;  and  speak  as  we 
may  of  fatality,  justice,  or  mystery,  it  is 
always  God  whom  we  fear :  a  being,  that 
is,  like  ourselves,  though  almighty,  eter- 
nal, invisible,  and  infinite.  A  moral  force 
that  was  not  conceived  in  the  image  of 
man  would  most  likely  inspire  no  fear. 
It  is  not  the  unknown  in  nature  that  fills 
us  with  dread ;  it  is  not  the  mystery  of 
the  world  we  live  in.  It  is  the  mystery 
of  another  world  from  which  we  recoil ; 
it  is  the  moral,  and  not  the  material, 
enigma.  There  is  nothing,  for  instance, 
more  obscure  than  the  combination  of 
causes  which  produce  the  earthquake,  that 
most  terrible  of  all  catastrophes.  But  the 
earthquake,  though  it  alarm  our  body,  will 
bring  no  fear  to  our  mind  unless  we  re- 
gard it  as  an  act  of  justice,  of  mysterious 
vengeance,  of  supernatural  punishment. 
And  so  it  is,  too,  with  the  thunderstorm, 
with  illness,  with  death,  with  the  myriad 
184 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

phenomena  and  accidents  of  life.  It 
would  seem  as  though  the  true  alarm  of 
our  soul,  the  great  fear  which  stirs  other 
instincts  within  us  than  that  of  mere  self- 
preservation,  is  only  called  forth  by  the 
thought  of  a  more  or  less  determinate 
God,  of  a  mysterious  consciousness,  a 
permanent,  invisible  justice,  or  a  vigilant, 
eternal  Providence.  But  does  the  "  inter- 
preter of  life,"  who  succeeds  in  arousing 
this  fear,  bring  us  thereby  nearer  to  truth, 
and  is  it  his  mission  to  convey  to  us  sor- 
row, and  trouble,  and  painful  emotion,  or 
peace,  satisfaction,  tranquillity,  and  light? 

[a8] 

It  is  not  easy,  I  know,  to  free  oneself 
wholly  from  traditional  interpretation,  for 
it  often  succeeds  in  reasserting  its  sway 
upon  us  at  the  very  moment  we  strain 
every  nerve  to  escape  from  our  bondage. 
So  has  it  happened  with  Ibsen,  who,  in  his 
»»5 


The  Buried  Temple 

search  for  a  new  and  almost  scientific  form 
of  fatality,  erected  the  veiled,  majestic,  ty- 
rannical figure  of  heredity  in  the  centre  of 
the  very  best  of  his  dramas.  But  it  is  not 
the  scientific  mystery  of  heredity  which 
awakens  within  us  those  human  fears  that 
lie  so  much  deeper  than  the  mere  animal 
fear;  for  heredity  alone  could  no  more 
achieve  this  result  than  could  the  scientific 
mystery  of  a  dreaded  disease,  a  stellar  or 
marine  phenomenon.  No,  the  fear  that 
differs  so  essentially  from  the  one  called 
forth  by  an  imminent  natural  danger,  is 
aroused  within  us  by  the  obscure  idea  of 
justice  which  heredity  assumes  in  the 
drama;  by  the  daring  pronouncement 
that  the  sins  of  the  fathers  are  almost 
invariably  visited  on  the  children ;  by  the 
suggestion  that  a  sovereign  Judge,  a  god- 
dess of  the  species,  is  for  ever  watching 
our  actions,  inscribing  them  on  her  tablets 
of  bronze,  and  balancing  in  her  eternal 
i86 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery- 
hands  rewards  long  deferred  and  never- 
ending  punishment.  In  a  word,  even 
while  we  deny  it,  it  is  the  face  of  God 
that  reappears ;  and  from  beneath  the 
flagstone  one  had  believed  to  be  sealed 
for  ever  comes  once  again  the  murmur 
of  the  very  ancient  flame  of  Hell. 

[29] 

This  new  form  of  fatality,  or  fatal  jus- 
tice, is  less  defensible,  and  less  acceptable 
too,  than  the  ancient  and  elementary 
power,  which,  being  general  and  unde- 
fined, and  offering  no  too  strict  explana- 
tion of  its  actions,  lent  itself  to  a  far 
greater  number  of  situations.  In  the 
special  case  selected  by  Ibsen,  it  is  not 
impossible  that  some  kind  of  accidental 
justice  may  be  found,  as  it  is  not  impos- 
sible that  the  arrow  a  blind  man  shoots 
into  a  crowd  may  chance  to  strike  a  parri- 
cide. But  to  found  a  law  upon  this  acci- 
187 


The  Buried  Temple 

dental  justice  is  a  fresh  perversion  of 
mystery,  for  elements  are  thereby  intro- 
duced into  human  morality  which  have 
no  right  to  be  there ;  elements  which  we 
would  welcome,  which  would  be  of  value, 
if  they  stood  for  definite  truth ;  but  see- 
ing that  they  are  as  alien  to  truth  as  to 
actual  life,  they  should  be  ruthlessly  swept 
aside.  I  have  shown  elsewhere  that  our 
experience  fails  to  detect  the  most  minute 
trace  of  justice  in  the  phenomena  of 
heredity,  or  in  other  words,  that  it  fails 
to  discover  the  slightest  moral  connection 
between  the  cause :  the  fault  of  the  father, 
and  the  effect :  the  punishment  or  reward 
of  the  child. 

The  poet  has  the  right  to  fashion  hy- 
potheses, and  to  forge  his  way  ahead  of 
reality.  But  it  will  often  happen  that, 
when  he  imagines  himself  to  be  far  in 
advance,  he  will  truly  have  done  no  more 
than  turn  in  a  circle ;  that  where  he  be- 
i88 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

lieves  that  he  has  discovered  new  truth, 
he  has  merely  strayed  on  to  the  track  of 
a  buried  illusion.  In  the  case  I  have 
named,  for  the  poet  to  have  taught  us 
more  than  experience  teaches,  he  should 
have  ventured  still  further,  perhaps,  in 
the  negation  of  justice.  But  whatever 
our  opinion  may  be  on  this  point,  it  at 
least  is  clear  that  the  poet  who  desires  his 
hypotheses  to  be  legitimate,  and  of  service, 
must  take  heed  that  they  be  not  too  mani- 
festly contrary  to  the  experience  of  every- 
day life,  for  in  that  case  they  become 
useless  and  dangerous  —  scarcely  honour- 
able even,  if  the  error  be  deliberately 
made. 

[30] 

And    now,   what   are   we    to    conclude 

from  all  this  ?     Many  things,  if  one  will, 

but   this    above  all :  that  it  behoves  the 

"interpreter  of  life,"  no  less  than  those 

189 


The  Buried  Temple 

who  are  living  that  life,  to  exercise  greatest 
care  in  their  manner  of  handling  and  ad- 
mitting mystery,  and  to  discard  the  belief 
that  whatever  is  noblest  and  best  in  life  or 
in  drama  must  of  necessity  rest  in  the  part 
that  admits  of  no  explanation.  There 
are  many  most  beautiful,  most  human, 
most  admirable  works  which  are  almost 
entirely  free  from  this  "disquiet  of 
universal  mystery."  We  derive  no  great- 
ness, sublimity,  or  depth,  from  unceas- 
ingly fixing  our  thoughts  on  the  infinite 
and  the  unknown.  Such  meditation  be- 
comes truly  helpful  only  when  it  is  the 
unexpected  reward  of  the  mind  that  has 
loyally,  unreservedly,  given  itself  to  the 
study  of  the  finite  and  the  knowable ; 
and  to  such  a  mind  it  will  soon  be  revealed 
how  strangely  different  is  the  mystery 
which  precedes  what  one  does  not  know 
from  the  mystery  that  follows  closely  on 
what  one  has  learned.  The  first  would 
190 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

seem  to  contain  many  sorrows,  but  that  is 
only  because  the  sorrows  are  grouped 
too  closely,  and  have  their  home  upon 
two  or  three  peaks  that  stand  too  nearly 
together.  In  the  second  is  far  less  sad- 
ness, for  its  area  is  vast;  and  when  the 
horizon  is  wide,  there  exists  no  sorrow  so 
great  but  it  takes  the  form  of  a  hope. 

[31] 

Yes,  human  life,  viewed  as  a  whole, 
may  appear  somewhat  sorrowful;  and  it 
is  easier,  in  a  manner  pleasanter  even, 
to  speak  of  its  sorrows  and  let  the  mind 
dwell  on  them,  than  to  go  in  search  of, 
and  bring  into  prominence,  the  consola- 
tions life  has  to  offer.  Sorrows  abound 
—  infallible,  evident  sorrows  ;  consolations, 
or  rather  the  reasons  wherefore  we  accept 
with  some  gladness  the  duty  of  life,  are 
rare  and  uncertain,  and  hard  of  detection. 
Sorrows  seem  noble,  and  lofty,  and  fraught 
191 


The  Buried  Temple 

with  deep  mystery ;  with  mystery  that 
almost  is  personal,  that  we  feel  to  be 
near  to  us.  Consolations  appear  egotis- 
tical, squalid,  at  times  almost  base.  But 
for  all  that,  and  whatever  their  ephemeral 
likeness  may  be,  we  have  only  to  draw 
closer  to  them  to  find  that  they  too 
have  their  mystery ;  and  if  this  seem 
less  visible  and  less  comprehensible,  it  is 
only  because  it  lies  deeper  and  is  far 
more  mysterious.  The  desire  to  live, 
the  acceptance  of  life  as  it  is,  may  per- 
haps be  mere  vulgar  expressions;  but, 
yet  they  are  probably  in  unconscious  har- 
mony with  laws  that  are  vaster,  more  con- 
formable with  the  spirit  of  the  universe, 
and  therefore  more  sacred,  than  is  the 
desire  to  escape  the  sorrows  of  life,  or  the 
lofty  but  disenchanted  wisdom  that  for 
ever  dwells  on  those  sorrows. 


193 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

Our  impulse  is  always  to  depict  life  as 
more  sorrowful  than  truly  it  is ;  and  this  is 
a  serious  error,  to  be  excused  only  by  the 
doubts  that  at  present  hang  over  us.  No 
satisfying  explanation  has  so  far  been  found. 
The  destiny  of  man  is  as  subject  to  un- 
known forces  to-day  as  it  was  in  the  days 
of  old ;  and  though  it  be  true  that  some 
of  these  forces  have  vanished,  others  have 
arisen  in  their  stead.  The  number  of 
those  that  are  really  all-powerful  has  in  no 
way  diminished.  Many  attempts  have 
been  made,  and  in  countless  fashions,  to 
explain  the  action  of  these  forces  and  ac- 
count for  their  intervention ;  and  one 
might  almost  believe  that  the  poets, 
aware  of  the  futility  of  these  explanations 
in  face  of  a  reality  which,  all  things  not- 
withstanding, is  ever  revealing  more  and 
more  of  itself,  have  fallen  back  on  fatality 
13  193 


The  Buried  Temple 

as  in  some  measure  representing  the  in- 
explicable, or  at  least  the  sadness  of  the 
inexplicable.  This  is  all  that  we  find  in 
Ibsen,  the  Russian  novels,  the  highest  class 
of  modern  fiction,  Flaubert,  etc.  (see  War 
and  Peace i  for  instance,  U Education  Senti- 
mentaky  and  many  others). 

It  is  true  that  the  fatality  shown  is  no 
longer  the  goddess  of  old,  or  rather  (at 
least  to  the  bulk  of  mankind)  the  clearly 
determinate  God,  inflexible,  implacable,^ 
arbitrary,  blind,  although  constantly  watch- 
ful ;  the  fatality  of  to-day  is  vaster,  more 
formless,  more  vague,  less  human  or 
actively  personal,  more  indifferent  and 
more  universal.  In  a  word,  it  is  now  no 
more  than  a  provisional  appellation  be- 
stowed, until  better  be  found,  on  the  gen- 
eral and  inexplicable  misery  of  man.  In 
this  sense  we  may  accept  it,  perhaps, 
though  we  do  no  more  than  give  a  new 
name    to    the    unchanging   enigma,   and 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

throw  no  light  on  the  darkness.  But  we 
have  no  right  to  exaggerate  its  importance 
or  the  part  that  it  plays ;  no  right  to 
believe  that  we  are  truly  surveying  man- 
kind and  events  from  a  point  of  some 
loftiness,  beneath  a  definitive  light,  or  that 
there  is  nothing  to  seek  beyond,  because 
at  times  we  become  deeply  conscious  of  the 
obscure  and  invincible  force  that  lies  at 
the  end  of  every  existence.  Doubtless, 
from  one  point  of  view,  unhappiness  must 
always  remain  the  portion  of  man,  and  the 
fatal  abyss  be  ever  open  before  him,  vowed 
as  he  is  to  death,  to  the  fickleness  of  matter, 
to  old  age  and  disease.  If  we  fix  our 
eyes  only  upon  the  end  of  a  life,  the  hap- 
piest and  most  triumphant  existence  must 
of  necessity  contain  its  elements  of  misery 
and  fatality.  But  let  us  not  make  a  wrong 
use  of  these  words ;  above  all,  let  us  not, 
through  listlessness,  or  undue  inclination 
to  mystic  sorrow,  be  induced  to  lessen  the 
195 


The  Buried  Temple 

part  of  what  could  be  explained  if  we  would 
only  give  more  eager  attention  to  the 
ideas,  the  passions  and  feelings  of  the  life 
of  man  and  the  nature  of  things.  Let  us 
always  remember  that  we  are  steeped  in 
the  unknown ;  for  this  thought  is  the 
most  fruitful  of  all,  the  most  sustaining 
and  salutary.  But  the  neutrality  of  the 
unknown  does  not  warrant  our  attribut- 
ing to  it  a  force,  designs,  or  hostility, 
which  it  cannot  be  proved  to  possess.  At 
Erfurt,  in  his  famous  interview  with 
Goethe,  Napoleon  is  said  to  have  spoken 
disparagingly  of  the  dramas  in  which  fatal- 
ity plays  a  great  part,  —  the  plays  that 
we,  in  our  "  passion  for  calamity,"  are  apt 
to  consider  the  finest.  "They  belong," 
he  remarked,  "  to  an  epoch  of  darkness ; 
but  how  can  fatality  touch  us  to-day  ? 
Policy  —  that  is  fatality !  "  Napoleon's 
dictum  is  not  very  profound ;  policy  is 
only  the  merest  fragment  of  fatality  ;  and 
196 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

his  destiny  soon  made  it  manifest  to  him 
that  the  desire  to  contain  fatality  within 
the  narrow  bounds  of  policy  was  no  more 
than  a  vain  endeavour  to  imprison  in  a 
fragile  vase  the  mightiest  of  the  spirit- 
ual rivers  that  bathe  our  globe.  And 
yet,  incomplete  as  this  thought  of  Napo- 
leon's may  have  been,  it  still  throws  some 
light  on  a  tributary  of  the  great  river.  It 
was  a  little  thing,  perhaps,  but  on  these 
uncertain  shores  it  is  the  difference  be- 
tween a  little  thing  and  nothing  that 
kindles  the  energy  of  man  and  confirms 
his  destiny.  By  this  ray  of  light,  such  as 
it  was,  he  long  was  enabled  to  dominate 
all  that  portion  of  the  unknown  which  he 
declined  to  term  fatality.  To  us  who 
come  after  him,  the  portion  of  the  un- 
known that  he  controlled  may  well  seem 
insufficient,  if  surveyed  from  an  eminence, 
and  yet  it  was  truly  one  of  the  vastest 
that  the  eye  of  man  has  ever  embraced. 
197 


The  Buried  Temple 

Through  its  means  every  action  of  his 
was  accomplished,  for  evil  or  good.  This 
is  not  the  place  to  judge  him,  or  even  to 
wonder  whether  the  happiness  of  a  cen- 
tury might  not  have  been  better  served 
had  he  allowed  events  to  guide  him : 
what  we  are  considering  here  is  the  docil- 
ity of  the  unknown.  For  us,  with  our 
humbler  destinies,  the  problem  still  is  the 
same,  and  the  principle  too;  the  prin- 
ciple being  that  of  Goethe :  "  to  stand  on 
the  outermost  limit  of  the  conceivable ; 
but  never  to  overstep  this  line,  for  beyond 
it  begins  at  once  the  land  of  chimeras, 
whose  phantoms  and  mists  are  fraught 
with  danger  to  the  mind."  It  is  only 
when  the  intervention  of  the  mysterious, 
irresistible,  or  invisible  becomes  strikingly 
real,  actually  perceptible,  intelligent,  and 
moral,  that  we  are  entitled  to  yield,  or  lay 
down  our  arms,  meekly  accepting  the  in- 
active silence  they  bring ;  but  their  inter- 
198 


The  Evolution  of  Mystery 

vention,  within  these  limits,  is  rarer  than 
one  imagines.  Let  us  recognise  that  mys- 
tery of  this  kind  exists  ;  but,  until  it  reveal 
itself,  we  have  not  the  right  to  halt,  or 
relax  our  efforts  ;  not  the  right  to  cast 
down  our  eyes  in  submission,  or  be  silent, 
and  resigned. 


199 


Ill 

THE  KINGDOM  OF  MATTER 


Ill 

THE   KINGDOM   OF   MATTER 

[I] 

IN  a  preceding  essay  we  were  compelled 
to  admit  that,  eager  as  man  might  be 
to  discover  in  the  universe  a  sanction  for 
his  virtues,  neither  heaven  nor  earth  dis- 
played the  least  interest  in  human  moral- 
ity ;  and  that  all  things  would  combme  to 
persuade  the  upright  among  us  that  they 
merely  are  dupes,  were  it  not  for  the  fact 
that  they  have  in  themselves  an  approval 
words  cannot  describe,  and  a  reward  so 
intangible  that  we  should  in  vain  endeav- 
our to  portray  its  least  evanescent  delights. 
Is  that  all,  some  may  ask,  is  that  all 
we  may  expect  in  return  for  this  mighty 
203 


The  Buried  Temple 

effort  of  ours,  for  our  constant  denial  and 
pain,  for  our  sacrifice  of  instincts,  of 
pleasures,  that  seemed  so  legitimate,  nec- 
essary even,  and  that  would  certainly  have 
added  to  our  happiness  had  there  not 
been  within  us  the  desire  for  justice  —  a 
desire  arising  we  know  not  whence,  be- 
longing, perhaps,  to  our  nature,  and  yet 
in  apparent  conflict  with  the  vaster  nature 
whereof  we  all  form  part?  Yes,  it  is 
open  to  you,  if  you  choose,  to  regard 
as  a  very  poor  thing  this  unsubstantial 
justice :  since  its  only  reward  is  a  vague 
satisfaction,  which  even  grows  hateful,  and 
destroys  itself,  the  moment  its  presence 
becomes  too  perceptibly  felt.  Bear  in 
mind,  however,  that  all  things  that  hap- 
pen in  our  moral  being  must  be  equally 
lightly  held,  if  regarded  from  the  point 
of  view  whence  you  deliver  this  judgment. 
Love  is  a  paltry  affair,  the  moment  of 
possession  once  over  that  alone  is  real 
a  04 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

and  ensures  the  perpetuity  of  the  race ; 
and  yet  we  find  that  as  man  grows  more 
civilised,  the  act  of  possession  assumes 
ever  less  value  in  his  eyes  if  there  go  not 
with  it,  if  there  do  not  precede  and  follow 
it,  this  insignificant  emotion  built  up  of 
our  thoughts  and  our  feelings,  of  our 
sweetest  and  tenderest  hours  and  years. 
Beauty,  too,  is  a  trivial  matter :  a  beauti- 
ful spectacle,  a  beautiful  face,  or  body, 
or  gesture ;  a  melodious  voice,  or  noble 
statue  —  sunrise  at  sea,  flowers  in  a  gar- 
den, stars  shining  over  the  forest,  the 
river  by  moonlight  —  or  a  lofty  thought, 
an  exquisite  poem,  an  heroic  sacrifice  hid- 
den in  a  profound  and  pitiful  soul.  We 
may  admire  these  things  for  an  instant; 
they  may  bring  us  a  sense  of  completeness 
no  other  joy  can  convey  ;  but  at  the  same 
time  there  will  steal  over  us  a  tinge  of 
strange  sorrow,  unrest ;  nor  will  they  give 
happiness  to  us,  as  men  use  the  word, 
205 


The  Buried  Temple 

should  other  events  have  contrived  to 
make  us  unhappy.  They  produce  nothing 
the  eye  can  measure,  or  weigh ;  nothing 
that  others  can  see,  or  will  envy  ;  and  yet, 
were  a  magician  suddenly  to  appear,  capa- 
ble of  depriving  one  of  us  of  this  sense 
of  beauty  that  may  chance  to  be  in  him, 
possessed  of  the  power  of  extinguishing  it 
for  ever,  with  no  trace  remaining,  no  hope 
that  it  ever  will  spring  into  being  again  — 
would  we  not  rather  lose  riches,  tranquil- 
lity, health  even,  and  many  years  of  our 
life,  than  this  strange  faculty  which  none  can 
espy,  and  we  ourselves  can  scarcely  define  ? 
Not  less  intangible,  not  less  elusive,  is  the 
sweetness  of  tender  friendship,  of  a  dear 
recollection  we  cling  to  and  reverence; 
and  countless  other  thoughts  and  feelings, 
that  traverse  no  mountain,  dispel  no 
cloud,  that  do  not  even  dislodge  a  grain 
of  sand  by  the  roadside.  But  these  are 
the  things  that  build  up  what  is  best  and 
206 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

happiest  in  us;  they  are  we  ourselves; 
they  are  precisely  what  those  who  have 
them  not  should  envy  in  those  who  have. 
The  more  we  emerge  from  the  animal 
and  approach  what  seems  the  surest  ideal 
of  our  race,  the  more  evident  does  it  be- 
come that  these  things,  trifling  as  they 
well  may  appear  by  the  side  of  nature's 
stupendous  laws,  do  yet  constitute  our 
sole  inheritance ;  and  that,  happen  what 
may  to  the  end  of  time,  they  are  the  home, 
the  centre  of  light,  to  which  mankind  will 
draw  ever  more  and  more  closely. 

[O 

We  live  in  a  century  that  loves  the 
material,  but,  while  loving  it,  conquers  it, 
masters  it,  and  with  more  passion  than  any 
preceding  period  has  shown  ;  in  a  century 
that  would  seem  consumed  with  desire  to 
comprehend  matter,  to  penetrate,  enslave 
it,  possess  it,  once  and  for  all,  to  repletion, 
207 


The  Buried  Temple 

satiety  —  with  the  wish,  it  may  be,  to 
ransack  its  every  resource,  lay  bare  its 
last  secret,  so  as  to  free  the  future  from 
the  restless  search  for  a  happiness  there 
seemed  reason  once  to  believe  that  matter 
contained.  So,  in  like  fashion,  is  it  neces- 
sary first  to  have  known  the  love  of  the 
flesh  before  veritable  love  can  reveal  its 
deep  and  unchanging  purity.  A  serious 
reaction  will  probably  arise,  some  day, 
against  this  passion  for  material  enjoy- 
ment ;  but  man  will  never  be  able  to  cut 
himself  wholly  free.  Nor  would  the  at- 
tempt be  wise.  We  are,  after  all,  only 
fragments  of  animate  matter,  and  it  could 
not  be  well  to  lose  sight  of  the  starting- 
point  of  our  race.  And  yet,  is  it  right 
that  this  starting-point  should  enclose  in 
its  narrow  circumference  all  our  wishes, 
all  our  happiness,  the  totality  of  our  de- 
sires ?  In  our  passage  through  life  we 
meet  scarcely  any  who  do  not  persist, 
208 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

with  a  kind  of  unreasoning  obstinacy,  in 
throning  the  material  within  them,  and 
there  maintaining  it  supreme.  Gather  to- 
gether a  number  of  men  and  women,  all 
of  them  free  from  life's  more  depressing 
cares  —  an  assembly  of  the  elect,  if  you 
will  —  and  pronounce  before  them  the 
words  "beatitude,"  "happiness,"  "joy," 
"  felicity,"  "  ideal."  Imagine  that  an  angel, 
at  that  very  instant,  were  to  seize  and 
retain,  in  a  magic  mirror,  or  miraculous 
basket,  the  images  these  words  would 
evoke  in  the  souls  that  should  hear 
them.  What  would  you  see  in  the  basket 
or  mirror?  The  embrace  of  beautiful 
bodies ;  gold,  precious  stones,  a  palace, 
an  ample  park;  the  philtre  of  youth, 
strange  jewels  and  gauds  representing 
vanity's  dreams ;  and,  let  us  admit  it, 
prominent  far  above  all  would  be  sump- 
tuous repasts,  noble  wines,  glittering 
tables,  splendid  apartments.  Is  humanity 
14  209^ 


The  Buried  Temple 

still  too  near  its  beginning  to  conceive 
other  things?  Has  the  hour  not  yet 
arrived  when  we  might  have  reasonably- 
hoped  that  the  mirror  would  reflect  a 
powerful,  disinterested  intellect,  a  con- 
science at  rest,  a  just  and  loving  heart,  a 
perception,  a  vision,  capable  of  detecting 
absorbing  beauty  wherever  it  be  —  the 
beauty  of  evening,  of  cities,  of  forests  and 
seas,  no  less  than  of  face,  of  a  word  or  a 
smile,  an  action  or  movement  of  soul  ? 
The  foreground  of  the  magical  mirror  at 
present  reflects  beautiful  women,  un- 
draped ;  when  shall  we  see,  in  their  stead, 
the  deep,  great  love  of  two  beings  to 
whom  the  knowledge  has  come  that  it  is 
only  when  their  thoughts  and  their  feel- 
ings, and  all  that  is  more  mysterious  still 
than  thoughts  and  feelings,  have  blended, 
and  day  by  day  become  more  essentially 
one,  that  the  joys  of  the  flesh  are  freed 
from  the  after-disquiet,  and  leave  no  bit- 

210 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

terness  behind  ?  When  shall  we  find, 
instead  of  the  morbid,  unnatural  excite- 
ment produced  by  too  copious,  oppressive 
repasts,  by  stimulants  that  are  the  insidious 
agents  of  the  very  enemy  we  seek  to 
destroy  —  when  shall  we  find,  in  their 
place,  the  contained  and  deliberate  glad- 
ness of  a  spirit  that  is  for  ever  exalted 
because  it  for  ever  is  seeking  to  understand, 
and  to  love  ?  .  .  .  These  things  have 
long  been  known,  and  their  repetition  may 
well  seem  of  little  avail.  And  yet,  we 
need  but  to  have  been  twice  or  thrice  in 
the  company  of  those  who  stand  for  what 
is  best  in  mankind,  most  intellectually, 
sentiently  human,  to  realise  how  uncertain 
and  groping  their  search  is  still  for  the 
happier  hours  of  life ;  to  marvel  at  the 
resemblance  the  unconscious  happiness 
they  look  for  bears  to  the  happiness 
craved  by  the  man  who  has  no  spiritual 
existence;  to  note  how  opaque,  to  their 

SIX 


The  Buried  Temple 

eyes,  is  the  cloud  which  separates  all  that 
pertains  to  the  being  who  rises  from  all 
that  is  his  who  descends.  Some  will  say 
that  the  hour  is  not  yet  when  man  can 
thus  make  clear  division  between  the 
part  of  the  spirit  and  that  of  the  flesh. 
But  when  shall  that  hour  be  looked  for 
if  those  for  whom  it  should  long  since 
have  sounded  still  suifer  the  obscurest 
prejudice  of  the  mass  to  guide  them  when 
they  set  forth  in  search  of  their  happiness  ? 
When  they  achieve  glory  and  riches,  when 
love  comes  to  meet  them,  they  will  be 
free,  it  may  be,  from  a  few  of  the  coarser 
satisfactions  of  vanity,  a  few  of  the  grosser 
excesses ;  but  beyond  this  they  strive  not 
at  all  to  secure  a  happiness  that  shall 
be  more  spiritual,  more  purely  human. 
The  advantage  they  have  does  not  teach 
them  to  widen  the  circle  of  material 
exaction,  to  discard  what  is  less  justifiable. 
In  their  attitude  towards  the  pleasures  of 

212 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

life  they  submit  to  the  same  spiritual 
deprivation  as,  let  us  say,  some  cultured 
man  who  may  have  wandered  into  a 
theatre  where  the  play  being  performed 
is  not  one  of  the  five  or  six  masterpieces 
of  universal  literature.  He  is  fully  aware 
that  his  neighbours'  applause  and  delight 
are  called  forth,  in  the  main,  by  more  or 
less  obnoxious  prejudices  on  the  subject 
of  honour,  glory,  religion,  patriotism, 
sacrifice,  liberty,  or  love  —  or  perhaps 
by  some  feeble,  dreary  poetical  eflfiision. 
None  the  less,  he  will  find  himself  sharing 
in  the  general  enthusiasm  ;  and  it  will  be 
necessary  for  him,  almost  at  every  instant, 
to  pull  himself  violently  together,  to  make 
startled  appeal  to  every  conviction  within 
him,  in  order  to  convince  himself  that 
these  partisans  of  hoary  errors  are  wrong, 
notwithstanding  their  number,  and  that 
he,  with  his  isolated  reason,  alone  is 
right. 

»'3 


The  Buried  Temple 

[3] 

Indeed,  when  we  consider  the  relation 
of  man  to  matter,  it  is  surprising  to  find 
how  litde  light  has  yet  been  thrown  upon 
it,  how  little  has  been  definitely  fixed. 
Elementary,  imperious,  as  this  relation 
undoubtedly  is,  humanity  has  always  been 
wavering,  uncertain,  passing  from  the 
most  dangerous  confidence  to  the  most 
systematic  distrust,  from  adoration  to 
horror,  from  asceticism  and  complete 
renouncement  to  their  corresponding 
extremes.  The  days  are  past  when  an 
irrational,  useless  abstinence  was  preached, 
and  put  into  practice  —  an  abstinence 
often  fully  as  harmful  as  habitual  excess. 
We  are  entitled  to  all  that  helps  to  main- 
tain, or  advance,  the  development  of  the 
body ;  this  is  our  right,  but  it  has  its 
limits ;  and  these  limits  it  would  be  well 
to  define  with  the  utmost  exactness,  for 
214 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

whatever  may  trespass  beyond  must  in- 
fallibly weaken  the  growth  of  that  other 
side  of  ourselves,  the  flower  that  the  leaves 
round  about  it  will  either  stifle  or  nourish. 
And  humanity,  that  so  long  has  been 
watching  this  flower,  studying  it  so  in- 
tently, noting  its  subtlest,  most  fleeting 
perfumes  and  shades,  is  most  often  con- 
tent to  abandon  to  the  caprice  of  the 
temperament,  be  this  evil  or  good,  to  the 
passing  moment,  or  to  chance,  the  govern- 
ment of  the  unconscious  forces  that  will, 
like  the  leaves,  be  discreetly  active,  sustain- 
ing, life-giving,  or  profoundly  selfish, 
destructive,  and  fatal.  Hitherto,  perhaps, 
this  may  have  been  done  with  impunity ; 
for  the  ideal  of  mankind  (which,  at  the 
start,  was  concerned  with  the  body  alone) 
wavered  long  between  matter  and  spirit. 
To-day,  however,  it  clings,  with  ever  pro- 
founder  conviction,  to  the  human  intelli- 
gence.    We  no  longer  strive  to  compete 

215 


The  Buried  Temple 

with  the  lion,  the  panther,  the  great  an- 
thropoid ape,  in  force  or  agility  ;  in  beauty 
with  the  flower,  or  the  shine  of  the  stars 
on  the  sea.  The  utilisation  by  our  in- 
tellect of  every  unconscious  force,  the 
gradual  subjugation  of  matter  and  the 
search  for  its  secret  —  these  at  present 
appear  the  most  evident  aim  of  our  race 
and  its  most  probable  mission.  In  the 
days  of  doubt  there  was  no  satisfaction, 
or  even  excess,  but  was  excusable  and 
moral,  so  long  as  it  wrought  no  irreparable 
loss  of  strength  or  actual  organic  harm. 
But  now  that  the  mission  of  the  race  is 
becoming  more  clearly  defined,  the  duty 
lies  on  us  to  leave  on  one  side  whatever  is 
not  directly  helpful  to  the  spiritual  part 
of  our  being.  Sterile  pleasures  of  the 
body  must  be  gradually  sacrificed  ;  indeed, 
in  a  word,  all  that  is  not  in  absolute  har- 
mony with  a  larger,  more  durable  energy 
of  thought,  —  all  the    little   "  harmless  " 

2X6 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

delights  which,  however  inoffensive  com- 
paratively, keep  alive  by  example  and 
habit  the  prejudice  in  favour  of  inferior 
enjoyment,  and  usurp  the  place  that  be- 
longs to  the  satisfactions  of  the  intellect. 
These  last  differ  from  those  of  the  body, 
whose  development  some  may  assist  and 
others  retard.  Into  the  elysian  fields  of 
thought  enters  no  satisfaction  but  brings 
with  it  youth,  and  ardour,  and  strength  ; 
nor  is  there  a  thing  in  this  world  on 
which  the  mind  thrives  more  readily  than 
the  ecstasy,  nay,  the  debauch,  of  eager- 
ness, comprehension,  and  wonder. 

[4] 

The  time  must  come,  sooner  or  later, 
when  our  morality  will  have  to  conform 
to  the  probable  mission  of  the  race,  and 
the  arbitrary,  often  ridiculous  restrictions 
whereof  it  is  at  present  composed  will  be 
compelled  to  make  way  for  the  inevitable, 
217 


The  Buried  Temple 

logical  restrictions  this  mission  exacts. 
For  the  individual,  as  for  the  race,  there 
can  be  but  one  code  of  morals  —  the  sub- 
ordination of  the  methods  of  life  to  the 
demands  of  the  general  mission  that  ap- 
pears entrusted  to  man.  The  axis  will 
shift,  therefore,  of  many  sins,  many  great 
offences  ;  until  at  last  for  all  the  crimes 
against  the  body  there  shall  be  substituted 
the  veritable  crimes  against  human  des- 
tiny :  in  other  words,  whatever  may  tend 
to  impair  the  authority,  integrity,  leisure, 
liberty,  or  power,  of  the  intellect. 

But  by  this  we  are  far  from  suggesting 
that  the  body  should  be  regarded  as  the 
irreconcilable  enemy  that  the  Christian 
theory  holds  it.  Far  from  that,  we 
should  strive,  first  of  all,  to  endow  it 
with  all  possible  vigour  and  beauty.  But 
it  is  like  a  capricious  child :  exacting,  im- 
provident, selfish ;  and  the  stronger  it 
grows,  the  more  dangerous   does   it   be- 

2X8 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

come.  It  knows  no  cult  but  that  of  the 
passing  moment.  In  imagination,  desires, 
it  halts  at  the  trivial  thought,  the  primi- 
tive, fleeting,  foolish  delight  of  the  little 
dog  or  the  negro.  The  satisfactions  pro- 
cured by  the  intellect — the  comfort, 
security,  leisure,  the  gladness  —  it  regards 
as  no  more  than  its  due,  and  enjoys  in 
fullest  complacency.  Left  to  itself  it 
would  enjoy  these  so  stupidly,  savagely, 
that  it  would  very  soon  stifle  the  intel- 
lect from  which  it  derived  these  favours. 
Hence  there  is  need  for  certain  restrictions, 
renouncements,  which  all  men  must  ob- 
serve; not  only  those  who  have  reason 
to  hope,  and  believe,  that  they  are  eflFec- 
tively  striving  to  solve  the  enigma,  to 
bring  about  the  fulfilment  of  human 
destiny  and  the  triumph  of  mind  over 
insensible  matter,  but  also  the  crowds  in 
the  ranks  of  the  massive  unconscious 
rearguard,  who  placidly  watch  the  phos- 
219 


The  Buried  Temple 

phorescent  evolutions  of  mind  as  its  light 
gleams  on  the  world's  elementary  dark- 
ness. For  humanity  is  a  unique  and 
unanimous  entity.  When  the  thought  of 
the  mass  —  that  thought  which  scarcely 
is  thought — travels  downwards,  its  in- 
fluence is  felt  by  philosopher  and  poet, 
astronomer  and  chemist;  it  has  its  pro- 
nounced effect  on  their  character,  morals, 
ideals,  their  sense  of  duty,  habits  of  labour, 
intellectual  vigour.  If  the  myriad,  uni- 
form, petty  ideas  in  the  valley  fall  short 
of  a  certain  elevation,  no  great  idea  shall 
spring  to  life  on  the  mountain-peak. 
Down  there  the  thought  may  have  little 
strength,  but  there  are  countless  numbers 
who  think  it ;  and  the  influence  this 
thought  acquires  may  be  almost  termed 
atmospheric.  And  they  up  above  on  the 
mountain,  the  precipice,  or  the  edge 
of  the  glacier,  will  be  helped  by  this 
influence,  or  harmed,  in  the  degree  of 
aao 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

its  brightness  or  gloom,  of  its  reaching 
them,  buoyed  up  with  generous  feeling, 
or  heavily  charged  with  brutal  habit  and 
coarse  desire.  The  heroic  action  of  a 
people  (as,  for  instance,  the  French  Revo- 
lution, the  Reformation,  all  wars  of  inde- 
pendence and  liberation)  will  fertilise  and 
purify  this  influence  for  more  centuries 
than  one.  But  far  less  will  satisfy  those 
who  toil  at  the  fulfilment  of  destiny.  Let 
but  the  habits  of  the  men  round  about 
them  become  a  little  more  noble,  their 
desires  a  little  more  disinterested  ;  let  but 
their  passions  and  eagerness,  their  pleas- 
ures and  love,  be  illumined  by  one  ray  of 
brightness,  of  grace,  of  spiritual  fervour ; 
and  those  up  above  will  feel  the  support, 
and  draw  their  breath  freely,  no  longer 
compelled  to  struggle  with  the  instinctive 
part  of  themselves  ;  and  the  power  that 
is  in  them  will  obey  the  more  readily,  and 
mould  itself  to  their  hand.     The  peasant 

221 


The  Buried  Temple 

who  Instead  of  carousing  at  the  beer-shop 
spends  a  peaceful  Sunday  at  home,  with 
a  book,  beneath  the  trees  of  his  orchard ; 
the  humble  citizen  whom  the  emotions  or 
din  of  the  race-course  cannot  tempt  from 
some  worthy  relaxation,  from  the  pleasure 
of  a  reposeful  afternoon  ;  the  workman 
who  no  longer  makes  the  streets  hideous 
with  obscene  or  ridiculous  song,  but 
wanders  forth  into  the  country,  or,  from 
the  ramparts,  watches  the  sunset — all 
these  bring  their  meed  of  help :  their 
great  assistance,  unconscious  though  it  be, 
and  anonymous,  to  the  triumph  of  the 
vast  human  flame. 

[J] 

But  how  much  there  is  to  be  done,  and 
learned,  before  this  great  flame  can  arise 
in  serene,  secure  brightness !  We  have 
said  that  man,  in  his  relation  to  matter,  is 
still  in  the  experimental,  groping  stage  of 

928 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

his  earliest  days.  He  lacks  even  definite 
knowledge  as  to  the  kind  of  food  best 
adapted  for  him,  or  the  quantity  of  nour- 
ishment he  requires ;  he  is  still  uncertain 
as  to  whether  he  be  carnivorous  or  frugiv- 
orous.  His  intellect  misleads  his  instinct. 
It  was  only  yesterday  that  he  learned  that 
he  had  probably  erred  hitherto  in  the 
choice  of  his  nourishment;  that  he  must 
reduce  by  two-thirds  the  quantity  of  nitro- 
gen he  absorbs,  and  largely  increase  the 
volume  of  hydrocarbons ;  that  a  little 
fruit,  or  milk,  a  few  vegetables,  farinaceous 
substances  —  now  the  mere  accessory  of 
the  too  plentiful  repasts  which  he  works 
so  hard  to  provide,  which  are  his  chief 
object  in  life,  the  goal  of  his  efforts,  of  his 
strenuous,  incessant  labour  —  are  amply 
sufficient  to  maintain  the  ardour  of  the 
finest  and  mightiest  life.  It  is  not  my 
purpose  to  discuss  the  question  of  vege- 
tarianism, or  to  meet  the  objections  that 
223 


The  Buried  Temple 

may  be  urged  against  it ;  though  it  must 
be  admitted  that  of  these  objections  not 
one  can  withstand  a  loyal  and  scrupulous 
inquiry.  I,  for  my  part,  can  affirm  that 
those  whom  I  have  known  to  submit  to 
this  regimen,  have  found  its  result  to  be 
restored  or  improved  health,  marked  addi- 
tion of  strength,  and  the  acquisition  by 
the  mind  of  a  clearness,  brightness,  well- 
being,  such  as  might  follow  the  release 
from  some  secular,  loathsome,  detestable 
dungeon.  But  we  must  not  conclude 
these  pages  with  an  essay  on  alimen- 
tation, reasonable  as  such  a  proceeding 
might  be.  For  in  truth  all  our  justice, 
morality,  all  our  thoughts  and  feelings, 
derive  from  three  or  four  primordial  neces- 
sities, whereof  the  principal  one  is  food. 
The  least  modification  of  one  of  these 
necessities  would  entail  a  marked  change 
in  our  moral  existence.  Were  the  belief 
one  day  to  become  general  that  man  could 
234 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

nourish  himself  without  animal  food, 
there  would  ensue  not  only  a  great  eco- 
nomic revolution  and  change, —  for  a 
bullock,  to  produce  one  pound  of  meat, 
consumes  more  than  a  hundred  pounds 
of  provender,  —  but  a  moral  improve- 
ment as  well ;  for  we  find  that  the  man 
who  abandons  the  regimen  of  meat  aban- 
dons alcohol  also;  and  to  do  this  is  to 
renounce  most  of  the  coarser  and  more 
degraded  pleasures  of  life.  And  it  is  in 
the  passionate  craving  for  these  pleas- 
ures, in  their  glamour,  and  the  prejudice 
they  create,  that  the  most  formidable 
obstacle  is  found  to  the  harmonious 
development  of  the  race.  Detachment 
therefrom  creates  noble  leisure,  a  new 
order  of  desires,  a  wish  for  enjoyment 
that  must  of  necessity  be  loftier  than 
the  gross  satisfactions  which  have  their 
origin  in  alcohol.  But  are  days  such  as 
IS  225 


The  Buried  Temple 

these  in  store  for  us  —  these  happier, 
purer  hours?  The  crime  of  alcohol  is 
not  alone  that  it  destroys  its  faithful  and 
poisons  one-half  of  the  race,  but  also 
that  it  exercises  a  profound,  though  in- 
direct, influence  upon  those  who  recoil 
from  it  in  dread.  The  idea  of  pleasure 
which  it  maintains  in  the  crowd  forces 
its  way,  by  means  of  the  crowd's  irre- 
sistible action,  into  the  life  even  of  the 
elect,  and  lessens,  perverts,  all  that  con- 
cerns man's  peace,  and  repose,  his  ex- 
pansiveness,  gladness,  and  joy ;  retarding, 
too,  it  may  safely  be  said,  the  birth  of 
the  truer,  profounder  ideal  of  happiness ; 
one  that  shall  be  simpler,  more  peaceful 
and  grave,  more  spiritual  and  human. 
This  ideal  is  evidently  still  very  imagi- 
nary and  may  seem  of  but  little  im- 
portance ;  and  infinite  time  must  elapse, 
as  in  all  other  cases,  before  the  certitude 
226 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

of  those  who  are  convinced  that  the  race 
so  far  has  erred  in  the  choice  of  its 
aliment  (assuming  the  truth  of  this 
statement  to  be  borne  out  by  experience) 
shall  reach  the  confused  masses,  and  bring 
them  enlightenment  and  comfort.  But 
may  this  not  be  the  expedient  nature  holds 
in  reserve  for  the  time  when  the  struggle 
for  life  shall  have  become  too  hopelessly 
unbearable,  —  the  struggle  for  life  that 
to-day  means  the  fight  for  meat  and  for 
alcohol,  double  source  of  injustice  and 
waste  whence  all  the  others  are  fed, 
double  symbol  of  a  happiness  and  neces- 
sity whereof  neither  is  human  ? 

[6] 

Whither  is  humanity  tending?  This 
anxiety  of  man  to  know  the  aim  and  the 
end  is  essentially  human ;  it  is  a  kind  of 
infirmity,  or  provincialism  of  the  mind, 
and  has  nothing  in  common  with  univer- 
227 


The  Buried  Temple 

sal  reality.  Have  things  an  aim  ?  Why 
should  they  have ;  and  what  aim  or  end 
can  there  be,  in  an  infinite  organism  ? 

But  even  though  our  mission  be  only 
to  fill  for  an  instant  a  diminutive  space 
that  could  as  well  be  filled  by  the  violet 
or  grasshopper,  without  loss  to  the  uni- 
verse of  economy  or  grandeur,  without 
the  destinies  of  this  world  being  shortened 
or  lengthened  by  one  hour ;  even  though 
this  march  of  ours  count  for  nothing, 
though  we  move  for  the  sake  of  motion, 
tending  nowhither,  this  futile  progress  of 
ours  may,  nevertheless,  still  claim  to  absorb 
all  our  attention  and  interest;  and  this 
is  entirely  reasonable,  it  is  the  loftiest 
course  we  can  pursue.  If  it  lay  in  the 
power  of  an  ant  to  study  the  laws  of  the 
stars ;  and  if,  intent  on  this  study,  though 
fully  aware  that  these  laws  are  immutable, 
never  to  be  modified,  it  declined  to  con- 
cern itself  further  with  the  aflfairs  or  the 
338 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

future  of  the  ant-hill  —  should  we,  who 
stand  to  the  insect  as  the  great  gods  are 
supposed  to  stand  to  ourselves,  who  judge 
it  and  dominate  it  as  we  believe  ourselves 
to  be  dominated  and  judged,  —  should  we 
approve  this  ant,  or,  for  all  its  universality, 
regard  it  as  either  good  or  moral  ? 

Reason,  at  its  apogee,  becomes  sterile ; 
and  inertia  would  be  its  sole  teaching  did 
it  not,  after  recognising  the  pettiness,  the 
nothingness,  of  our  passions  and  hopes, 
of  our  being,  and  lastly,  of  reason  itself, 
retrace  its  footsteps  back  to  the  point 
whence  it  shall  be  able  once  more  to 
take  eager  interest  in  all  these  poor  trivi- 
alities, in  this  same  nothingness,  as  hold- 
ing them  the  only  things  in  the  world 
for  which  its  assistance  has  value. 

We  know  not  whither  we  go,  but  may 

still  rejoice  in  the  journey;  and  this  will 

become  the  lighter,  the  happier,  for  our 

endeavour  to  picture  to  ourselves  the  next 

229 


The  Buried  Temple 

place  of  halt.  Where  will  this  be  ?  The 
mountain-pass  lies  ahead,  and  threatens; 
but  the  roads  already  are  widening  and 
becoming  less  rugged;  the  trees  spread 
their  branches  crowned  with  fresh  blossom  ; 
silent  waters  are  flowing  before  us,  repose- 
ful and  peaceful.  Tokens  all  these,  it 
may  be,  of  our  nearing  the  vastest  valley 
mankind  yet  has  seen  from  the  height  of 
the  tortuous  paths  it  has  ever  been  climb- 
ing! Shall  we  call  it  the  "First  Valley 
of  Leisure  "  ?  Distrust  as  we  may  the  sur- 
prises that  the  future  may  have  in  store,  be 
the  troubles  and  cares  that  await  us  never 
so  burdensome,  there  still  seems  some 
ground  for  believing  that  the  bulk  of  man- 
kind will  know  days  when,  thanks,  it  may 
be,  to  machinery,  agricultural  chemistry, 
medicine  perhaps,  or  I  know  not  what 
dawning  science,  labour  will  become  less 
incessant,  exhausting,  less  material,  tyran- 
nical, pitiless.  What  use  will  humanity 
230 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

make  of  this  leisure?  On  its  employ- 
ment may  be  said  to  depend  the  whole 
destiny  of  man.  Were  it  not  well  that  his 
counsellors  now  should  begin  to  teach  him 
to  use  such  leisure  as  he  has  in  a  nobler 
and  worthier  fashion?  It  is  the  way  in 
which  hours  of  freedom  are  spent  that 
determines,  as  much  as  war  or  as  labour, 
the  moral  worth  of  a  nation.  It  raises  or 
lowers,  it  replenishes  or  exhausts.  At 
present  we  find,  in  these  great  cities  of 
ours,  that  three  days*  idleness  will  fill  the 
hospitals  with  victims  whom  weeks  or 
months  of  toil  had  left  unscathed. 

[7] 

Thus  we  return  to  the  happiness  which 
should  be,  and  perhaps  in  course  of  time 
will  be,  the  real  human  happiness.  Had 
we  taken  part  in  the  creation  of  the 
world  we  should  probably  have  bestowed 
more  distinctive,  special  force  on  all  that  is 


The  Buried  Temple 

best  in  man,  most  immaterial,  most  essen- 
tially human.  If  a  thought  of  love,  or  a 
gleam  of  the  intellect,  a  word  of  justice, 
an  act  of  pity,  a  desire  for  pardon,  or 
sacrifice ;  if  a  gesture  of  sympathy,  a  crav- 
ing of  one's  whole  being  for  beauty,  good- 
ness, or  truth  —  if  emotions  like  these 
could  affect  the  universe  as  they  affect  the 
man  who  has  felt  them,  they  would  call 
forth  miraculous  flowers,  supernatural  radi- 
ance, inconceivable  melody;  they  would 
scatter  the  night,  recall  spring  and  the 
sunshine,  stay  the  hand  of  sickness,  grief, 
disaster,  and  misery ;  gladness  would  arise 
from  them,  and  youth  be  restored ;  while 
the  mind  would  gain  freedom,  thought 
immortality,  and  life  be  eternal.  No  re- 
sistance could  check  them;  their  reward 
would  follow  as  visibly  as  it  follows  the 
labourer's  toil,  the  nightingale's  song,  or 
the  work  of  the  bee.  But  we  have 
learned  at  last  that  the  moral  world  is  a 
232 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 
world  wherein  man  is  alone;  a  world, 
contained  in  ourselves,  that  bears  no  re- 
lation to  matter,  upon  which  its  influence 
is  only  of  the  most  hazardous  and  excep- 
tional kind.  But  none  the  less  real,  there- 
fore, is  this  world,  or  less  infinite:  and  if 
words  break  down  when  they  try  to  tell  of 
it,  the  reason  is  only  that  words,  after  all, 
are  mere  fragments  of  matter,  seeking  to 
enter  a  sphere  where  matter  holds  no 
dominion.  Words  are  for  ever  betraying 
the  thought  that  they  stand  for,  by  the 
images  which  they  evoke.  When  we  try 
to  express  perfect  joy,  a  noble,  spiritual 
ecstasy,  a  profound,  everlasting  love,  our 
words  can  only  compare  them  with  animal 
passion,  drunkenness,  brutal  and  coarse 
desire.  And  not  only'  do  they  thus  de- 
grade the  noblest  triumphs  of  the  soul 
of  man  by  likening  them  to  primitive 
instincts,  but  they  incite  us  to  believe, 
in  spite  of  ourselves,  that  the  object  or 
233 


The  Buried  Temple 

feeling  compared  is  less  real,  less  true  or 
substantial,  than  the  type  to  which  it  is 
referred.  Herein  lies  the  injustice  and 
weakness  of  every  attempt  that  is  made 
to  give  voice  to  the  secrets  of  men.  And 
yet,  be  words  never  so  faulty,  let  us  still 
pay  careful  heed  to  the  events  of  this 
inner  world.  For  of  all  the  events  it  has 
lain  in  our  power  to  meet  hitherto,  they 
alone  truly  are  human. 

[8] 

Nor  should  they  be  regarded  as  useless, 
even  though  the  immense  torrent  of  ma- 
terial forces  absorb  them  as  it  absorbs  the 
dew  that  falls  from  the  pale  morning 
flower.  Boundless  as  the  world  may  be 
wherein  we  live,  it  is  yet  as  hermetically 
enclosed  as  a  sphere  of  steel.  Nothing 
can  fall  outside  it,  for  it  has  no  outside ; 
nor  can  any  atom  possibly  be  lost.  Even 
though  our  species  should  perish  entirely, 
a34 


The  Kingdom  of  Matter 

the  stage  through  which  it  has  caused  cer- 
tain fragments  of  matter  to  pass  would 
remain,  notwithstanding  all  ulterior  trans- 
formations, an  indelible  principle  and  an 
immortal  cause.  The  formidable,  pro- 
visional vegetations  of  the  primary  epoch, 
the  chaotic  and  immature  monsters  of  the 
secondary  grounds,  —  Plesiosaurus,  Ich- 
thyosaurus, Pterodactyle,  —  these  might 
also  regard  themselves  as  vain  and  ephem- 
eral attempts,  ridiculous  experiments  of 
a  still  puerile  nature ;  and  imagine  that 
they  would  leave  no  mark  upon  a  more 
harmonious  globe.  And  yet  not  an  effort 
of  theirs  has  been  lost  in  space.  They 
purified  the  air,  they  softened  the  un- 
breathable  flame  of  oxygen,  they  paved 
the  way  for  the  more  symmetrical  life  of 
those  who  should  follow.  If  our  lungs 
find  in  the  atmosphere  the  aliment  they 
need,  it  is  thanks  to  the  inconceivably 
incoherent  forests  of  arborescent  fern. 
235 


The  Buried  Temple 

Our  brains  and  nerves  of  to-day  are  due 
to  fearful  hordes  of  swimming  or  flying 
reptiles.  These  obeyed  the  order  of  their 
life.  They  did  what  they  had  to  do. 
They  modified  matter  in  the  fashion  pre- 
scribed to  them.  And  we,  by  carrying 
particles  of  this  same  matter  to  the  degree 
of  extraordinary  incandescence  proper  to 
the  thought  of  man,  shall  surely  establish 
in  the  future  something  that  never  shall 
perish. 


956 


IV 

THE   PAST 


IV 

THE   PAST 

[I] 

OUR  past  stretches  behind  us  in  long 
perspective.  It  slumbers  in  the 
distance  like  a  deserted  city  shrouded  in 
mist.  A  few  peaks  mark  its  boundary, 
and  soar  predominant  into  the  air ;  a  few 
important  acts  stand  out  like  towers,  some 
with  the  light  still  upon  them,  others  half 
ruined,  and  slowly  decaying  beneath  the 
weight  of  oblivion.  The  trees  are  bare,  the 
walls  crumble,  and  shadow  slowly  steals  over 
all.  Everything  seems  to  be  dead  there, 
and  rigid,  save  only  when  memory,  slowly 
decomposing,  lights  it  for  an  instant  with 
an  illusory  gleam.  But  apart  from  this 
animation,  derived  only  from   our  expir- 

2!39 


The  Buried  Temple 

ing  recollections,  all  would  appear  to  be 
definitely  motionless,  immutable  forever; 
divided  from  present  and  future  by  a 
river  that  shall  not  again  be  crossed. 

In  reality  it  is  alive;  and,  for  many 
of  us,  endowed  with  a  profounder,  more 
ardent  life  than  either  present  or  future. 
In  reality  this  dead  city  is  often  the  hot- 
bed of  our  existence :  and  in  accordance 
with  the  spirit  in  which  men  return  to  it, 
shall  some  find  all  their  wealth  there,  and 
others  lose  what  they  have. 

Our  conception  of  the  past  has  much  in 
common  with  our  conception  of  love  and 
happiness,  destiny,  justice,  and  most  of  the 
vague  but  therefore  not  less  potent  spir- 
itual organisms  that  stand  for  the  mighty 
forces  we  obey.  Our  ideas  have  been 
handed  down  to  us  ready-made  by  our 
predecessors  :  and  even  when  our  second 
240 


The  Past 

consciousness  wakes,  and,  proud  in  its 
conviction  that  henceforth  nothing  shall 
be  accepted  blindly,  proceeds  most  care- 
fully to  investigate  these  ideas,  it  will 
squander  its  time  questioning  those  that 
loudly  protest  their  right  to  be  heard,  and 
pay  no  heed  to  the  others  close  by,  that 
as  yet,  perhaps,  have  said  nothing.  Nor 
have  we,  as  a  rule,  far  to  go  to  discover 
these  others.  They  are  in  us,  and  of  us : 
they  wait  for  us  to  address  them.  They 
are  not  idle,  notwithstanding  their  silence. 
Amid  the  noise  and  babble  of  the  crowd, 
they  are  tranquilly  directing  a  portion  of 
our  real  life;  and  as  they  are  nearer  to 
truth  than  their  self-satisfied  sisters,  they 
will  often  be  far  more  simple,  and  far 
more  beautiful  too. 

[3] 

Among  the  most  stubborn  of  these  ready- 
made  ideas  are  those  that  preside    over 
16  241 


The  Buried  Temple 

our  conception  of  the  past,  and  render  it  a 
force  as  imposing  and  rigid  as  destiny :  a 
force  that  indeed  becomes  destiny  working 
backwards,  with  its  hand  outstretched  to 
the  destiny  that  burrows  ahead,  to  which 
it  transmits  the  last  link  of  our  chains. 
The  one  thrusts  us  back,  the  other  urges 
us  forward,  with  a  like  irresistible  vio- 
lence. But  the  violence  of  the  past  is 
perhaps  more  terrible,  and  more  alarm- 
ing. One  may  disbelieve  in  destiny.  It 
is  a  god  whose  onslaught  many  have  never 
experienced.  But  no  one  would  dream 
of  denying  the  oppressiveness  of  the  past. 
Sooner  or  later  its  effect  must  inevitably 
be  felt.  Those  even  who  refuse  to  admit 
the  intangible  will  credit  the  past,  which 
their  finger  can  touch,  with  all  the  mystery, 
the  influence,  the  sovereign  intervention, 
whereof  they  have  stripped  the  powers 
that  they  have  dethroned;  thus  render- 
ing it  the  almost  unique  and  therefore 
242 


The  Past 

more  dreadful   god  of  their  depopulated 
Olympus. 

[4] 

The  force  of  the  past  is  indeed  one  of 
the  heaviest  that  weigh  upon  men  and 
incline  them  to  sadness.  And  yet  there 
is  none  more  docile,  more  eager  to  follow 
the  direction  we  could  so  readily  give  did 
we  but  know  how  best  to  avail  ourselves 
of  this  docility.  In  reality,  if  we  think  of 
it,  the  past  belongs  to  us  quite  as  much 
as  the  present,  and  is  far  more  malle- 
able than  the  future.  Like  the  past,  and 
to  a  much  greater  extent  than  the  future, 
its  existence  is  all  in  our  thoughts,  and 
our  hand  controls  it ;  nor  is  this  only  true 
of  our  material  past,  wherein  there  are 
ruins  that  we  perhaps  can  restore ;  it  is 
true  also  of  the  regions  that  are  closed  to 
our  tardy  desire  for  atonement ;  it  is  true, 
above  all,  of  our  moral  past,  and  of  what 
we  consider  to  be  most  irreparable  there. 
243 


The  Buried  Temple 

[5] 

"  The  past  is  past,"  we  say,  and  it  is 
false:  the  past  is  always  present.  "We 
have  to  bear  the  burden  of  our  past,**  we 
sigh,  and  it  is  false ;  the  past  bears  our 
burden ;  "  Nothing  can  wipe  out  the 
past,"  and  it  is  false ;  the  least  effort  of 
will  sends  present  and  future  travelling 
over  the  past,  to  efface  whatever  we  bid 
them  efface ;  "  The  indestructible,  irrep- 
arable, immutable  past,"  and  that  is 
no  truer  than  the  rest.  In  those  who 
speak  thus  it  is  the  present  that  is  im- 
mutable, and  knows  not  how  to  repair. 
"My  past  is  wicked,  it  is  sorrowful, 
empty,"  we  say  again  ;  "  as  I  look  back 
I  can  see  no  moment  of  beauty,  of  happi- 
ness or  love  ;  I  see  nothing  but  wretched 
ruins  .  .  ."  And  that  is  false  ;  for  you 
see  precisely  what  you  yourself  place  there 
at  the  moment  your  eyes  rest  upon  it. 
244 


The  Past 

[6] 

Our  past  depends  entirely  upon  our 
present,  and  is  constantly  changing  with 
it.  Our  past  is  contained  in  our  memory : 
and  this  memory  of  ours,  that  feeds  on 
our  heart  and  brain,  and  is  incessantly 
swayed  by  them,  is  the  most  variable 
thing  in  the  world,  the  least  independent, 
the  most  impressionable.  Our  chief  con- 
cern with  the  past,  that  which  truly  re- 
mains and  forms  part  of  us,  is  not  what 
we  have  done  or  the  adventures  that  we 
have  met  with,  but  the  moral  reactions 
bygone  events  are  producing  within  us 
at  this  very  moment,  the  inward  being 
they  have  helped  to  form ;  and  these  re- 
actions, that  give  birth  to  our  sovereign, 
intimate  being,  are  wholly  governed  by 
the  manner  in  which  we  regard  past 
events,  and  vary  as  the  moral  substance 
varies  that  they  encounter  within  us. 
«4S 


The  Buried  Temple 

But  with  every  step  in  advance  that  our 
feelings  or  intellect  take,  a  change  will 
come  in  this  moral  substance ;  and  then, 
on  the  instant,  the  most  immutable  facts, 
that  seemed  to  be  graven  for  ever  on  the 
stone  and  bronze  of  the  past,  will  assume 
an  entirely  different  aspect,  will  return  to 
life  and  leap  into  movement,  bringing 
us  vaster  and  more  courageous  counsels, 
dragging  memory  aloft  with  them  in  their 
ascent ;  and  what  was  once  a  mass  of  ruin, 
mouldering  in  the  darkness,  becomes  a 
populous  city  whereon  the  sun  shines 
again. 

[7] 

We  have  an  arbitrary  fashion  of  estab- 
lishing a  certain  number  of  events  behind 
us.  We  relegate  them  to  the  horizon 
of  our  memory  ;  and  having  set  them 
there,  we  tell  ourselves  that  they  form 
part  of  a  world  in  which  the  united  efforts 
346 


The  Past 

of  all  mankind  could  not  wipe  away  a 
tear  or  cause  a  flower  to  lift  its  head. 
And  yet,  while  admitting  that  these  events 
have  passed  beyond  our  control,  we  still, 
with  the  most  curious  inconsistency,  be- 
lieve that  they  have  full  control  over  us. 
Whereas  the  truth  is  that  they  can  only 
act  upon  us  to  the  extent  in  which  we 
have  renounced  our  right  to  act  upon 
them.  The  past  asserts  itself  only  in 
those  whose  moral  growth  has  ceased ; 
then,  and  not  till  then,  does  it  be- 
come redoubtable.  From  that  moment 
we  have  indeed  the  irreparable  behind  us, 
and  the  weight  of  what  we  have  done 
lies  heavy  upon  our  shoulders.  But  so 
long  as  the  life  of  our  mind  and  character 
flows  uninterruptedly  on,  so  long  will  the 
past  remain  in  suspense  above  us  ;  and, 
as  the  glance  may  be  that  we  send  towards 
it,  will  it,  complaisant  as  the  clouds  Ham- 
let showed  to  Polonius,  adopt  the  shape 
243^ 


The  Buried  Temple 

of  the  hope  or  fear,  the  peace  or  disquiet, 
that  we  are  perfecting  within  us. 

[8] 
No  sooner  has  our  moral  activity 
weakened  than  accomplished  events  rush 
forward  and  assail  us ;  and  woe  to  him 
who  opens  the  door  to  them  and  permits 
them  to  take  possession  of  his  hearth  ! 
Each  one  will  vie  with  the  others  in  over- 
whelming him  with  the  gifts  best  calcu- 
lated to  shatter  his  courage.  It  matters 
not  whether  our  past  has  been  happy  and 
noble,  or  lugubrious  and  criminal,  —  there 
shall  still  be  great  danger  in  allowing  it 
to  enter,  not  as  an  invited  guest,  but  like 
a  parasite  settling  upon  us.  The  result 
will  be  either  sterile  regret  or  impotent 
remorse  ;  and  remorse  and  regrets  of  this 
kind  are  equally  disastrous.  In  order  to 
draw  from  the  past  what  is  precious  within 
it  —  and  most  of  our  wealth  is  there  — 
248 


The  Past 

we  must  go  to  it  at  the  hour  when  we 
are  strongest,  most  conscious  of  mastery  ; 
enter  its  domain  and  there  make  choice 
of  what  we  require,  discarding  the  rest, 
and  laying  our  command  upon  it  never 
to  cross  our  threshold  without  our  order. 
Like  all  things  that  only  can  live  at  the 
cost  of  our  spiritual  strength,  it  will  soon 
learn  to  obey.  At  first,  perhaps,  it  will 
endeavour  to  resist.  It  will  have  re- 
course to  artifice  and  prayer.  It  will 
try  to  tempt  us,  to  cajole.  It  will  drag 
forward  frustrated  hopes,  and  joys  that 
are  gone  for  ever,  broken  aflfections,  well- 
merited  reproaches,  expiring  hatred,  and 
love  that  is  dead,  squandered  faith,  and 
perished  beauty :  it  will  thrust  before  us 
all  that  once  had  been  the  marvellous  es- 
sence of  our  ardour  for  life ;  it  will  point 
to  the  beckoning  sorrows,  decaying  happi- 
ness, that  now  haunt  the  ruin.  But  we 
shall  pass  by,  without  turning  our  head; 
249 


The  Buried  Temple 

our  hand  shall  scatter  the  crowd  of  mem- 
ories, even  as  the  sage  Ulysses,  in  the 
Cimmerian  night,  with  his  sword  pre- 
vented the  shades  —  even  that  of  his 
mother,  whom  it  was  not  his  mission  to 
question  —  from  approaching  the  black 
blood  that  would  for  an  instant  have 
given  them  life  and  speech.  We  shall 
go  straight  to  the  joy,  the  regret  or  re- 
morse, whose  counsel  we  need ;  or  to  the 
act  of  injustice  it  behoves  us  scrupulously 
to  examine,  in  order  either  to  make  repa- 
ration, if  such  still  be  possible,  or  that 
the  sight  of  the  wrong  we  did,  whose 
victims  have  ceased  to  be,  is  required  to 
give  us  the  indispensable  force  that  shall 
lift  us  above  the  injustice  it  still  lies  in 
us  to  commit. 

[9] 

Yes,   even    though    our   past    contain 
crimes  that  now  are  beyond  the  reach  of 
250 


The  Past 

our  best  endeavours,  even  then,  if  we 
consider  the  circumstances  of  time  and 
place,  and  the  vast  plane  of  each  human 
existence,  these  crimes  fade  out  of  our 
life  the  moment  we  feel  that  no  tempta- 
tion, no  power  on  earth,  could  ever  in- 
duce us  to  commit  the  like  again.  The 
world  has  not  forgiven  —  there  is  but 
little  that  the  external  sphere  will  forget 
or  forgive  —  and  their  material  effects 
will  continue,  for  the  laws  of  cause  and 
effect  are  different  from  those  which  gov- 
ern our  consciousness.  At  the  tribunal 
of  our  personal  justice,  however,  —  the 
only  tribunal  which  has  decisive  action 
on  our  inaccessible  life,  as  it  is  the  only 
one  whose  decrees  we  cannot  evade,  whose 
concrete  judgments  stir  us  to  our  very 
marrow  —  the  evil  action  that  we  regard 
from  a  loftier  plane  than  that  at  which  it 
was  committed,  becomes  an  action  that 
no  longer  exists  for  us  save  in  so  far  as 
251 


The  Buried  Temple 

it  may  serve  in  the  future  to  render  our 
fall  more  difficult ;  nor  has  it  the  right  to 
lift  its  head  again  except  at  the  moment 
when  we  incline  once  more  towards  the 
abyss  it  guards. 

Bitter,  surely,  must  be  the  grief  of  him 
in  whose  past  there  are  acts  of  injustice 
whereof  every  avenue  now  is  closed,  who 
is  no  longer  able  to  seek  out  his  victims, 
and  raise  them  and  comfort  them.  To 
have  abused  one's  strength  in  order  to 
despoil  some  feeble  creature  who  has 
definitely  succumbed  beneath  the  blow, 
to  have  callously  thrust  suffering  upon  a 
loving  heart,  or  merely  misunderstood 
and  passed  by  a  touching  affection  that 
offered  itself — these  things  must  of  ne- 
cessity weigh  heavily  upon  our  life,  and 
induce  a  sorrow  within  us  that  shall  not 
readily  be  forgotten.  But  it  depends  on 
the  actual  point  our  consciousness  has 
attained  whether  our  entire  moral  des- 
252 


The  Past 

tiny  shall  be  depressed,  or  lifted,  beneath 
this  burden.  Our  actions  rarely  die ;  and 
many  unjust  deeds  of  ours  will  therefore 
inevitably  return  to  life  some  day  to 
claim  their  due  and  start  legitimate  repri- 
sals. They  will  find  our  external  life 
without  defence ;  but  before  they  can 
reach  the  inward  being  at  the  centre  of 
that  life  they  must  first  listen  to  the  judg- 
ment we  have  already  passed  on  ourselves  ; 
and  in  accordance  with  the  nature  of  that 
judgment  will  the  attitude  be  of  these 
mysterious  envoys,  who  have  come  from 
the  depths  where  cause  and  effect  are 
established  in  eternal  equilibrium.  If  it 
has  indeed  been  from  the  heights  of  our 
newly  acquired  consciousness  that  we  have 
questioned  ourselves,  and  condemned,  they 
will  not  be  menacing  justiciaries  whom  we 
shall  suddenly  see  surging  in  from  all 
sides,  but  benevolent  visitors,  friends  we 
have  almost  expected ;  and  they  will  draw 
253 


The  Buried  Temple 

near  us  in  silence.  They  know  in  ad- 
vance that  the  man  before  them  is  no 
longer  the  guilty  creature  they  sought; 
and  instead  of  pouring  hatred,  revolt,  and 
despair  into  his  heart,  or  punishments 
that  degrade  and  kill,  they  come  charged 
with  ennobling,  consoling,  and  purifying 
thought  —  a  penance. 

[lo] 

The  things  which  differentiate  the 
happy  and  strong  from  those  who  weep 
and  will  not  be  consoled,  all  derive  from 
the  one  same  principle  of  confidence  and 
ardour  ;  and  thus  it  is  that  the  manner  in 
which  we  are  able  to  recall  what  we  have 
done  or  suffered  is  far  more  important 
than  our  actual  sufferings  or  deeds.  No 
past,  viewed  by  itself,  can  seem  happy ; 
and  the  privileged  of  fate,  who  reflect  on 
what  remains  of  the  happy  years  that 
have  flown,  have  perhaps  more  reason 
254 


The  Past 

for  sorrow  than  the  unfortunate  ones  who 
brood  over  the  dregs  of  a  life  of  wretched- 
ness. Whatever  was  one  day  and  has 
now  ceased  to  be  makes  for  sadness ; 
above  all,  whatever  was  very  happy  and 
very  beautiful.     The  object  of  our  regrets 

—  whether  these  revolve  around  what  has 
been  or  might  have  been  —  is  therefore 
more  or  less  the  same  for  all  men,  and 
their  sorrow  should  be  the  same.  It  is 
not,  however ;  in  one  case  it  will  reign  un- 
interruptedly, whereas  in  another  it  will 
only  appear  at  very  long  intervals.  It 
must  therefore  depend  on  things  other 
than  accomplished  facts.  It  depends  on 
the  manner  in  which  men  will  act  on 
these  facts.    The  conquerors  in  this  world 

—  those  who  waste  no  time  setting  up 
an  imaginary  irreparable  and  immutable 
athwart  their  horizon,  those  who  seem  to 
be  born  afresh  every  morning  in  a  world 
that  forever  awakes  anew  to  the  future  — 

255 


The  Buried  Temple 

these  know  instinctively  that  what  appears 
to  exist  no  longer  is  still  existing  intact, 
that  what  appeared  to  be  ended  is  only 
completing  itself.  They  know  that  the 
years  time  has  taken  from  them  are  still 
in  travail ;  still,  under  their  new  master, 
obeying  the  old.  They  know  that  their 
past  is  forever  in  movement;  that  the 
yesterday  which  was  despondent,  decrepit 
and  criminal  will  return  full  of  joyousness, 
innocence,  youth,  in  the  track  of  to- 
morrow. They  know  that  their  image  is 
not  yet  stamped  on  the  days  that  are 
gone;  that  a  decisive  deed,  or  thought, 
will  suffice  to  break  down  the  whole  edi- 
fice ;  that,  however  remote  or  vast  the 
shadow  may  be  that  stretches  behind  them, 
they  have  only  to  put  forth  a  gesture  of 
gladness  or  hope  for  the  shadow  at  once 
to  copy  this  gesture,  and,  flashing  it  back 
to  the  remotest,  tiniest  ruins  of  early 
childhood  even,  to  extract  unexpected 
256 


The  Past 

treasure  from  all  this  wreckage.  They 
know  that  they  have  retrospective  action 
upon  all  bygone  deeds ;  and  that  the 
dead  themselves  will  annul  their  verdicts 
in  order  to  judge  afresh  a  past  that  to-day 
has  been  transfigured  and  endowed  with 
new  life. 

They  are  fortunate  who  find  this  in- 
stinct in  the  folds  of  their  cradle.  But 
may  the  others  not  imitate  it  who  have  it 
not ;  and  is  not  human  wisdom  charged 
to  teach  us  how  we  may  acquire  the  salu- 
tary instincts  that  nature  has  withheld  ? 

["] 

Let  us  not  lull  ourselves  to  sleep  in 
our  past ;  and  if  we  find  that  it  tends  to 
spread  like  a  vault  over  our  life,  instead  of 
incessantly  changing  beneath  our  eye  ;  if 
the  present  grow  into  the  habit  of  visiting 
it,  not  like  a  good  workman  repairing 
thither  to  execute  the  labours  imposed 
'7  «57 


The  Buried  Temple 

upon  him  by  the  commands  of  to-day, 
but  as  a  too  passive,  too  credulous  pilgrim 
content  idly  to  contemplate  beautiful, 
motionless  ruins  —  then  the  more  glo- 
rious, the  happier  that  our  past  may  have 
been,  with  all  the  more  suspicion  should 
it  be  regarded  by  us. 

Nor  should  we  yield  to  the  instinct  that 
bids  us  accord  it  profound  respect  if  this 
respect  induce  the  fear  in  us  that  we  may 
disturb  its  nice  equilibrium.  Better  the 
ordinary  past,  content  with  its  befitting 
place  in  the  shadow,  than  the  sumptuous 
past  which  claims  to  govern  what  has  trav- 
elled out  of  its  reach.  Better  a  mediocre, 
but  living,  present,  which  acts  as  though  it 
were  alone  in  the  world,  than  a  present 
which  proudly  expires  in  the  chains  of  a 
marvellous  long  ago.  A  single  step  that 
we  take  at  this  hour  towards  an  uncertain 
goal  is  far  more  important  to  us  than  the 
thousand  leagues  we  covered  in  our  march 
258 


The  Past 

towards  a  dazzling  triumph  in  the  days  that 
were.  Our  past  had  no  other  mission  than 
to  Hft  us  to  the  moment  at  which  we  are, 
and  there  equip  us  with  the  needful  expe- 
rience and  weapons,  the  needful  thought  and 
gladness.  If,  at  this  precise  moment,  it 
take  from  us  and  divert  to  itself  one  particle 
of  our  energy,  then,  however  glorious  it 
may  have  been,  it  still  was  useless,  and 
had  better  never  have  been.  If  we  allow 
it  to  arrest  a  gesture  that  we  were  about 
to  make,  then  is  our  death  beginning ;  and 
the  edifices  of  the  future  will  suddenly 
take  the  semblance  of  tombs. 

More  dangerous  still  than  the  past  of 
happiness  and  glory  is  the  one  inhabited 
by  overpowering  and  too  dearly  cherished 
phantoms.  Many  an  existence  perishes 
in  the  coils  of  a  fond  recollection.  And 
yet,  were  the  dead  to  return  to  this  earth, 
they  would  say,  I  fancy,  with  the  wisdom 
that  must  be  theirs  who  have  seen  what 
359 


The  Buried  Temple 

the  ephemeral  light  still  hides  from  us : 
"  Dry  your  eyes.  There  comes  to  us  no 
comfort  from  your  tears  ;  exhausting  you, 
they  exhaust  us  also.  Detach  yourself 
from  us,  banish  us  from  your  thoughts, 
until  such  time  as  you  can  think  of  us 
without  strewing  tears  on  the  life  we  still 
live  in  you.  We  endure  only  in  your 
recollection ;  but  you  err  in  believing  that 
your  regrets  alone  can  touch  us.  It  is 
the  things  you  do  that  prove  to  us  we  are 
not  forgotten,  and  rejoice  our  manes;  and 
this  without  your  knowing  it,  without  any 
necessity  that  you  should  turn  towards  us. 
Each  time  that  our  pale  image  saddens 
your  ardour,  we  feel  ourselves  die  anew, 
and  it  is  a  more  perceptible,  irrevocable 
death  than  was  our  other;  bending  too 
often  over  our  tombs,  you  rob  us  of  the 
life,  the  courage  and  love,  that  you  imag- 
ine you  restore. 

"  It  is  in  you  that  we  are,  it  is  in  all. 
a6o 


The  Past 

your  life  that  our  life  resides ;  and  as  you 
become  greater,  even  while  forgetting  us, 
so  do  we  become  greater  too,  and  our 
shades  draw  the  deep  breath  of  prisoners 
whose  prison  door  is  flung  open. 

"  If  there  be  anything  new  we  have 
learned  in  the  world  where  we  are  now,  it 
is,  first  of  all,  that  the  good  we  did  to  you 
when  we  were,  like  yourselves,  on  the 
earth,  does  not  balance  the  evil  wrought 
by  a  memory  which  saps  the  force  and  the 
confidence  of  life." 

[12] 

Above  all,  let  us  envy  the  past  of  no 
man.  Our  own  past  was  created  by  our- 
selves, and  for  ourselves  alone.  No  other 
could  have  suited  us,  no  other  could  have 
taught  us  the  truth  that  it  alone  can  teach, 
or  given  the  strength  that  it  alone  can 
give.  And  whether  it  be  good  or  bad, 
sombre  or  radiant,  it  still  remains  a  col- 
•6i 


The  Buried  Temple 

lection  of  unique  masterpieces  the  value 
of  which  is  known  to  none  but  ourselves; 
and  no  foreign  masterpiece  could  equal 
the  action  we  have  accomplished,  the  kiss 
we  received,  the  thing  of  beauty  that 
moved  us  so  deeply,  the  suffering  we 
underwent,  the  anguish  that  held  us  en- 
chained, the  love  that  wreathed  us  in 
smiles  or  in  tears.  Our  past  is  ourselves, 
what  we  are  and  shall  be ;  and  upon  this 
unknown  sphere  there  moves  no  creature, 
from  the  happiest  down  to  the  most  un- 
fortunate, who  could  foretell  how  great  a 
loss  would  be  his  could  he  substitute  the 
trace  of  another  for  the  trace  which  he 
himself  must  leave  in  life.  Our  past  is 
our  secret,  promulgated  by  the  voice  of 
years ;  it  is  the  most  mysterious  image 
of  our  being,  over  which  Time  keeps 
watch.  The  image  is  not  dead;  a  mere 
nothing  degrades  or  adorns  it ;  it  can  still 
grow  bright  or  sombre,  can  still  smile  or 
262 


The  Past 

weep,  express  love  or  hatred  :  and  yet  it 
remains  recognisable  for  ever  in  the  midst 
of  the  myriad  images  that  surround  it. 
It  stands  for  what  we  once  were,  as  our 
aspirations  and  hopes  stand  for  what  we 
shall  be  ;  and  the  two  faces  blend,  that 
they  may  teach  us  what  we  are. 

Let  us  not  envy  the  facts  of  the  past, 
but  rather  the  spiritual  garment  that  the 
recollection  of  days  long  gone  will  weave 
around  the  sage.  And  though  this  gar- 
ment be  woven  of  joy  or  of  sorrow, 
though  it  be  drawn  from  the  dearth  of 
events  or  from  their  abundance,  it  shall 
still  be  equally  precious ;  and  those  who 
may  see  it  shining  over  a  life  shall  not 
be  able  to  tell  whether  its  quickening 
jewels  and  stars  were  found  amid  the 
grudging  cinders  of  a  cabin  or  upon  the 
steps  of  a  palace. 

No  past  can  be  empty  or  squalid,  no 
events  can  be   wretched;    the  wretched- 
263 


The  Buried  Temple 

ness  lies  in  our  manner  of  welcoming 
them.  And  if  it  were  true  that  nothing 
had  happened  to  you,  that  would  be  the 
most  remarkable  adventure  that  any  man 
ever  had  met  with ;  and  no  less  remark- 
able would  be  the  light  it  would  shed 
upon  you.  In  reality  the  facts,  the  op- 
portunities and  possibilities,  the  passions, 
that  await  and  invite  the  majority  of  men, 
are  all  more  or  less  the  same.  Some  may 
be  more  dazzling  than  others ;  their  at- 
tendant circumstances  may  differ,  but  they 
differ  far  less  than  the  inward  reactions 
that  follow ;  and  the  insignificant,  incom- 
plete event  that  falls  on  a  fertile  heart 
and  brain  will  readily  attain  the  moral 
proportions  and  grandeur  of  an  analogous 
incident  which,  on  another  plane,  will 
convulse  a  whole  people. 

He  who  should  see,  spread  out  before 
him,  the  past  lives  of  a  multitude  of  men, 
could   not  easily   decide   which   past   he 
S64 


The  Past 

himself  would  wish  to  have  lived,  were 
he  not  able  at  the  same  time  to  witness 
the  moral  results  of  these  dissimilar  and 
unsymmetrical  facts.  He  might  not  im- 
possibly make  a  fatal  blunder;  he  might 
choose  an  existence  overflowing  with  in- 
comparable happiness  and  victory,  that 
sparkle  like  wonderful  jewels;  while  his 
glance  might  travel  indifferently  over  a 
life  that  appeared  to  be  empty,  whereas 
it  was  truly  steeped  to  the  brim  in  serene 
emotions  and  lofty,  redeeming  thoughts 
whereby,  though  the  eye  saw  nothing,  that 
life  was  yet  rendered  happy  among  all. 
For  we  are  well  aware  that  what  destiny 
has  given  and  what  destiny  holds  in  re- 
serve can  be  revolutionised  as  utterly  by 
thought  as  by  great  victory  or  great 
defeat.  Thought  is  silent :  it  disturbs 
not  a  pebble  on  the  illusory  road  we  see ; 
but  at  the  crossway  of  the  more  actual 
road  that  our  secret  life  follows  will  it 
265 


The  Buried  Temple 

tranquilly  erect  an  indestructible  pyramid ; 
and  thereupon,  suddenly,  every  event, 
to  the  very  phenomena  of  Earth  and 
Heaven,  will  assume  a  new  direction. 

In  Siegfried's  life  it  is  not  the  moment 
when  he  forges  the  prodigious  sword  that 
is  most  important,  or  when  he  kills  the 
dragon  and  compels  the  gods  from  his 
path,  or  even  the  dazzling  second  when 
he  encounters  love  on  the  flaming  moun- 
tain ;  but  indeed  the  brief  instant  wrested 
from  eternal  decrees,  the  little  childish 
gesture  when  one  of  his  hands,  red  with 
the  blood  of  his  mysterious  victim,  hav- 
ing chanced  to  draw  near  his  lips,  his 
eyes  and  ears  are  suddenly  opened :  he 
understands  the  hidden  language  of  all 
that  surrounds  him,  detects  the  treachery 
of  the  dwarf  who  represents  the  powers 
of  evil,  and  learns  in  a  flash  to  do  that 
which  had  to  be  done. 


266 


V 
LUCK 


V 
LUCK 

to 

ONCE  upon  a  time,  an  old  Servian 
legend  tells  us,  there  were  two 
brothers,  of  whom  one  was  industrious 
but  unfortunate,  and  the  other  lazy  but 
overwhelmingly  prosperous.  One  day 
the  unfortunate  brother  meets  a  beautiful 
girl  who  is  tending  sheep  and  weaving  a 
golden  thread.  "  To  whom  do  these 
sheep  belong  ?  "  he  asks.  "  They  belong 
to  whom  I  belong."  "  And  to  whom  do 
you  belong  ? "  "  To  your  brother :  I 
am  his  luck."  "  And  where  is  my  luck, 
then  ?  "  «  Very  far  from  here."  "  Can  I 
find  it?"  "Yes,  if  you  look  for  it." 
269 


The  Buried  Temple 

So  he  wanders  away  in  search  of  his 
luck.  And  one  evening,  in  a  great  for- 
est, he  comes  across  a  poor  old  woman 
asleep  under  a  tree.  He  wakes  her  and 
asks  who  she  is.  "  Don't  you  know 
me?"  she  answers.  "It  is  true  you 
have  never  seen  me  :  I  am  your  luck." 
"  And  who  is  it  has  given  me  so  wretched 
a  luck?"  "Destiny."  "Can  I  find 
Destiny  ?  "  "  Yes,  if  you  look  long 
enough." 

So  he  goes  off  in  search  of  Destiny. 
He  travels  a  very  long  time,  and  at  last 
she  is  pointed  out  to  him.  She  lives  in 
an  enormous  and  luxurious  palace ;  but 
her  wealth  is  dwindling  day  by  day,  and 
the  doors  and  windows  of  her  abode  are 
shrinking.  She  explains  to  him  that  she 
passes  thus,  alternatively,  from  misery  to 
opulence ;  and  that  her  situation  at  a 
given  moment  determines  the  future  of 
all  the  children  who  may  come  into  the 
270 


Luck 

world  at  that  moment.  "  You  were  born," 
she  says,  "  when  my  prosperity  was  on  the 
wane;  and  that  is  the  cause  of  your  ill- 
luck."  The  only  way,  she  tells  him,  to 
hoodwink  or  get  the  better  of  fortune 
would  be  to  substitute  the  luck  of  Militza, 
his  niece,  for  his  own,  seeing  that  she  was 
born  at  a  propitious  period.  All  he  need 
do,  she  says,  is  to  take  this  niece  into 
his  house,  and  to  declare  to  anyone  who 
may  ask.  him  that  all  he  has  belongs  to 
Militza. 

He  follows  her  advice,  and  his  affairs 
at  once  take  a  new  turn.  His  herds  mul- 
tiply and  grow  fat,  his  trees  are  bowed 
down  beneath  the  masses  of  fruit,  unex- 
pected inheritances  fall  in,  his  land  returns 
prodigious  crops.  But  one  morning,  as 
he  stands  there,  his  heart  filled  with 
happiness,  eyeing  a  magnificent  cornfield, 
a  stranger  asks  him  who  the  owner  may 
be  of  those  wonderful  ears  of  wheat,  which, 
271 


The  Buried  Temple 

as  they  sway  to  and  fro  beneath  the  dew, 
seem  twice  as  heavy  and  twice  as  high  as 
the  ears  in  the  adjoining  field.  He  for- 
gets himself,  and  answers,  "  They  are 
mine.'*  At  that  very  instant  fire  breaks 
out  in  the  opposite  end  of  the  field,  and 
commences  its  ravages.  Then  he  remem- 
bers the  advice  that  he  has  neglected  to 
follow.  He  runs  after  the  stranger  shout- 
ing, "  Stop,  come  back ;  I  made  a  mis- 
take ;  what  I  told  you  was  not  true ! 
This  field  is  not  mine ;  it  belongs  to  my 
niece  Militza  1"  And  the  flames  have  no 
sooner  heard  than  they  suddenly  fall 
away,  and  the  corn  shoots  up  afresh. 

This  naive  and  very  ancient  image, 
which  might  almost  serve  to-day  as  an 
illustration  of  our  actual  ignorance,  proves 
that  the  mysterious  problem  of  chance 
has  not  changed  from  the  time  of  man's 
272 


Luck 

first  questioning  look.  We  have  our 
thoughts,  which  build  up  our  intimate 
happiness  or  sorrow ;  and  upon  this 
events  from  without  have  more  or  less 
influence.  And  in  some  men  these 
thoughts  have  acquired  such  strength, 
such  vigilance,  that  without  their  consent 
nothing  can  enter  the  structure  of  crystal 
and  brass  they  have  been  able  to  raise  on 
the  hill  that  commands  the  wonted  road 
of  adventures.  And  we  have  our  will, 
which  our  thoughts  feed  and  sustain  ;  and 
many  useless  or  harmful  events  can  be 
held  in  check  by  our  will.  But  around 
these  islets,  within  which  is  a  certain  de- 
gree of  safety,  of  immunity  from  attack, 
extends  a  region  as  vast  and  uncontrol- 
lable as  the  ocean,  swayed  by  chance  as 
the  waves  are  swayed  by  the  wind.  Neither 
will  nor  thought  can  keep  one  of  these 
waves  from  suddenly  breaking  upon  us ; 
and  we   shall    be   caught   unawares,  and 

i8  273 


The  Buried  Temple 

perhaps  be  wounded  and  stunned.  Only 
when  the  wave  has  retreated  can  thought 
and  will  begin  their  beneficent  action. 
Then  they  will  raise  us,  and  bind  up  our 
wounds,  restore  animation,  and  take  care- 
ful heed  that  the  mischief  the  shock  has 
wrought  shall  not  touch  the  profound 
sources  of  life.  Their  mission  extends 
no  further,  and  may,  on  the  surface,  ap- 
pear very  humble.  In  reality,  however, 
unless  chance  assume  the  irresistible  form 
of  cruel  disease  or  death,  the  workings  of 
will  and  thought  shall  suffice  to  neutralise 
all  its  efforts,  and  to  preserve  what  is  best 
and  most  essential  to  man  in  human 
happiness. 

[3] 

Redoubtable,  multitudinous  chance  is 

for  ever  threading  its  watchful  way  through 

the  midst  of  the  events  we  have  foreseen, 

and  round  and  about  our  most  deliberate 

274 


Luck 

actions,  wherewith  we  slowly  trace  the 
broad  lines  of  our  existence.  The  air  we 
breathe,  the  time  we  traverse,  the  space 
through  which  we  move,  are  all  peopled 
by  lurking  circumstances,  which  pick  us 
out  from  among  the  crowd.  The  least 
study  of  their  habits  will  quickly  convince 
us  that  these  strange  daughters  of  hazard, 
who  should  be  blind  and  deaf  as  their 
father,  by  no  means  act  in  his  irresponsi- 
ble fashion.  They  are  well  aware  of  what 
they  are  doing,  and  rarely  make  a  mis- 
take. With  inexplicable  certainty  do  they 
move  to  the  passer-by  whom  they  have 
been  sent  to  confront,  and  lightly  touch 
his  shoulder.  Two  men  may  be  travelling 
upon  the  same  road,  and  at  the  same 
hour;  but  there  will  be  no  hesitation  or 
doubt  in  the  ranks  of  the  double  invisible 
troop  whom  fortune  has  ambushed  there. 
Towards  one  a  band  of  white  virgins  will 
hasten,  bearing  palms  and  amphorae,  pre- 
275 


The  Buried  Temple 

senting  the  thousand  unexpected  delights 
of  the  journey  ;  as  the  other  approaches, 
the  "  Evil  Women,"  whom  jEschylus 
tells  of,  hurl  themselves  from  the  hedges, 
as  though  they  were  charged  to  avenge, 
upon  this  unwitting  victim,  some  inexpli- 
cable crime  committed  by  him  before  he 
was  born, 

[4] 

There  is  scarcely  one  of  us  who  has  not 
been  able,  in  some  measure,  to  see  the 
workings  of  destiny  in  life  ;  we  have  all 
known  men  who  met  with  a  prosperity  or 
disaster  entirely  unconnected  with  any 
of  their  actions ;  men  upon  whom  good 
or  bad  luck  seemed  suddenly,  at  a  turn 
of  the  road,  to  spring  from  the  ground 
or  descend  from  the  stars,  undeserved, 
unprovoked,  but  complete  and  inevitable. 
One,  we  will  say,  who  has  scarcely  given 
a  thought  to  some  appointment  for  which 
276 


Luck 

he  knows  his  rival  to  be  better  equipped, 
will  see  this  rival  vanish  at  the  decisive 
moment ;  another,  who  has  counted  upon 
the  protection  of  a  most  influential  friend, 
will  see  this  friend  die  on  the  very  day 
when  his  assistance  could  be  of  value. 
A  third,  who  has  neither  talent  nor 
beauty,  will  arrive  each  morning  at  the 
Palace  of  Fortune,  Glory,  or  Love,  at  the 
brief  instant  when  every  door  lies  open  ; 
while  another,  a  man  of  great  merit,  who 
long  has  pondered  the  legitimate  step  he 
is  taking,  presents  himself  at  the  hour 
when  ill-luck  shall  close  the  gate  for  the 
next  half-century.  One  man  will  risk  his 
health  twenty  times,  in  imbecile  feats,  and 
never  experience  the  least  ill-effect ;  an- 
other will  deliberately  venture  it  in  an 
honourable  cause,  and  lose  it  without  hope 
of  return.  To  help  the  first,  thousands 
of  unknown  people,  who  never  have  seen 
him,  will  be  obscurely  working ;  to  hinder 
277 


The  Buried  Temple 

the  second,  thousands  of  unknown  people 
labour,  who  are  ignorant  of  his  existence. 
And  all,  on  the  one  side  as  well  as  the 
other,  are  totally  unaware  of  what  they 
are  doing :  they  obey  the  same  minute, 
widely  distributed  order ;  and  at  the  pre- 
scribed moment  the  detached  pieces  of  the 
mysterious  machine  join,  dovetail,  unite ; 
and  we  have  two  complete  and  dissimilar 
destinies  set  into  motion  by  Time. 

[5] 

In  a  curious  book  on  Chance  and  Destiny y 
Dr.  Foissac  gives  various  strange  exam^ 
pies  of  the  persistent,  inexplicable,  funda- 
mental, pre-ordained,  irreducible  iniquity, 
in  which  so  many  existences  are  steeped. 
As  we  go  through  page  after  page  we  feel 
almost  as  though  we  were  being  conducted 
through  the  disconcerting  laboratories  of 
another  world,  where,  in  the  absence  of 
every  instrument  that  human  justice  and 
278 


Luck 

reason  might  hold  indispensable,  happiness 
and  sorrow  were  being  parcelled  out  and 
allotted.  Take,  for  instance,  the  life  of 
Vauvenargues,  one  of  the  most  admirable 
of  men,  and  certainly,  of  all  the  great 
sages,  the  most  unfortunate.  Whenever 
his  fortune  hangs  in  the  balance  he  is  at- 
tacked and  prostrated  by  cruel  disease ; 
and  notwithstanding  the  efforts  of  his 
genius,  his  bravery,  his  moral  beauty,  day 
after  day  he  is  wantonly  betrayed  or  falls 
victim  to  gratuitous  injustice ;  and  at  the 
age  of  thirty-two  he  dies,  at  the  very  mo- 
ment when  recognition  is  at  last  awaiting 
his  work.  So  too  there  is  a  terrible  story 
of  Lesurques,^  in  which  we  see  a  thousand 

1  His  history  is  concisely  summed  up  by  Dr.  Foissac 
as  follows  :  *'  On  the  8th  Floreal  of  the  year  IV  the 
courier  and  postilion  who  were  taking  the  mail  from  Paris 
to  Lyons  were  attacked  and  murdered,  at  nine  in  the 
evening,  in  the  forest  of  Senart.  The  assassins  were 
Couriol,  who  had  taken  a  seat  in  the  cabriolet  by  the  side 
of  the  courier,  Durechal,  Rossi,  Vidal,  and  Dubosq,  who 
279 


The  Buried  Temple 

coincidences,  that  might  have  been  con- 
trived in  Hell,  blending  and  joining  to- 
had  come  to  meet  him  on  hired  horses,  and  lastly  Ber- 
nard, who  had  procured  the  horses  and  took  part  in  the 
subsequent  distribution  of  plunder.  For  this  crime,  in 
which  five  assassins  and  one  accomplice  shared,  se'ven  in- 
dividuals, within  the  space  of  four  years,  mounted  the 
steps  of  the  guillotine.  Justice,  therefore,  killed  one  man 
too  many  ;  the  sword  fell  upon  one  who  was  innocent  ; 
nor  could  he  have  been  one  of  these  six  individuals,  all  of 
whom  confessed  their  crime.  The  innocent  man  was 
Lesurques,  who  had  never  ceased  to  declare  he  was  not 
guilty  ;  and  all  his  alleged  accomplices  disavowed  any 
knowledge  of  him.  How,  then,  came  this  unfortunate 
creature  to  be  implicated  in  an  affair  that  was  to  confer 
so  sad  an  immortality  upon  his  name  ?  Fatality  so  con- 
trived that,  four  days  before  the  crime,  Lesurques,  who 
had  left  Douai  with  an  income  of  eighteen  thousand  livres, 
and  had  come  to  Paris  that  he  might  give  a  better  educa- 
tion to  his  children,  happened  to  be  lunching  with  a 
fellow-townsman  named  Guesno,  when  Couriol  came 
in  and  was  invited  to  join  them.  Suspicion  having  at 
once  fallen  upon  Couriol,  the  fact  of  this  lunch  was  sufH- 
cient  to  cause  Guesno  to  be  put  under  arrest  for  a  mo- 
ment ;  but  as  he  was  able  to  prove  an  alibi,  the  judge, ' 
Daubenton,  immediately  set  him  at  liberty.  Only,  as  it 
was  late,  Daubenton,  told  him  to  come  the  following  day 
to  fetch  his  paper. 

"In  the  morning  of  the  nth  Floreal  Guesno,  on  his 
280 


Luck 

gether  to  work  the  ruin  of  an  innocent 
man ;  while  truth,  chained  down  by  fate, 

way  for  this  purpose  to  the  Prefecture  of  Police,  met 
Lesurques,  whom  he  invited  to  accompany  him  ;  an  invi- 
tation which  Lesurques,  who  had  nothing  special  to  do, 
accepted.  While  they  were  waiting  in  the  antechamber 
for  the  magistrate  to  arrive,  two  women  were  shown  in 
who  had  been  asked  to  attend  in  connection  with  the 
affair  ;  and  they,  deceived  by  Lesurques '  resemblance 
to  Dubosq,  who  had  fled,  unhesitatingly  denounced  him 
as  one  of  the  assassins,  and  unfortunately  persisted  in  this 
statement  to  the  end.  The  antecedents  of  Lesurques 
pleaded  in  his  favour  ;  and  among  other  facts  that  he 
cited  to  prove  that  he  had  not  left  Paris  during  the  day 
of  the  8th  Floreal,  he  declared  that  he  had  been  present 
at  certain  dealings  that  had  taken  place  at  a  jeweller's 
named  Legrand,  between  this  last  and  another  jeweller 
named  AldenofF.  These  transactions  had  actually  taken 
place  on  the  8th  ;  but  Legrand,  on  being  requisitioned 
to  produce  his  books,  found  that  he  had  by  a  clerical 
blunder  inscribed  them  under  the  date  of  the  9th.  He 
thought  the  best  thing  he  could  do  would  be  to  scratch 
out  the  9  and  convert  it  into  an  8  ;  he  did  this  in  the  idea 
that  he  would  thereby  save  his  fellow-townsman,  Le- 
surques, whom  he  knew  to  be  innocent,  whereas  he 
actually  succeeded  in  ruining  him.  The  alteration  and 
substitution  were  easily  detected  j  from  that  moment  the 
prosecution  and  the  jury  declined  to  place  the  least  con- 
fidence in  the  eighty  witnesses  for  the  defence  called  by 
281 


The  Buried  Temple 

dumbly  shrieking  as  we  do  when  wrestling 
with  nightmare,  is  unable  to  put  forth  a 

the  accused  ;  he  was  convicted  and  his  property  confis- 
cated. Eighty-seven  days  elapsed  between  his  condem- 
nation and  execution,  a  delay  that  was  altogether  unusual 
at  that  period  ;  but  grave  doubts  had  arisen  as  to  his 
guilt. 

«'  The  Directorate  did  not  possess  the  right  of  reprieve  } 
they  felt  it  their  duty  to  refer  the  case  to  the  Council  of 
Five  Hundred,  asking  *  whether  Lesurques  was  to  die 
because  of  his  resemblance  to  a  criminal.'  The  Council 
passed  to  the  Order  of  the  Day  on  the  report  of  Simeon  j 
and  Lesurques  was  executed,  forgiving  his  judges.  And 
not  only  had  he  constantly  protested  his  innocence,  but 
at  the  moment  the  verdict  was  given  Couriol  had  cried  out, 
in  firm  tones,  *  Lesurques  is  innocent  ! '  He  repeated 
this  statement  both  on  the  fatal  hurdle  and  on  the  scaffold. 
All  the  other  prisoners,  while  admitting  their  own  guilt, 
also  declared  the  innocence  of  Lesurques.  It  was  only 
in  the  year  IX  that  Dubosq,  his  double,  was  arrested  and 
sentenced. 

**  The  fatality  that  had  attacked  the  head  of  the  family 
spared  none  of  its  members.  Lesurques'  mother  died  of 
grief ;  his  wife  went  mad  ;  his  three  children  languished 
in  insignificance  and  poverty.  The  government,  however, 
moved  by  their  great  misfortune,  restored  to  the  family 
of  Lesurques,  in  two  instalments,  the  five  or  six  hundred 
thousand  francs  which  had  been  so  iniquitously  confis- 
cated }  but  a  swindler  robbed  them  of  the  greater  part  of 
28a 


Luck 

single  gesture  that  shall  rend  the  veil  of 
night.     And  Aimar  de  Ransonnet,  Presi- 

the  money.  Sixty  years  elapsed  ;  of  Lesurques'  three 
children  two  were  dead  ;  one  alone  survived,  Virginie 
Lesurques.  Public  opinion  had  for  a  long  time  already 
proclaimed  the  innocence  and  the  rehabilitation  of  her 
unfortunate  father.  She  wanted  more  ;  and  when  the 
law  of  the  29th  June,  1867,  was  passed,  authorising  the  re- 
vision of  criminal  judgments,  she  hoped  that  the  day  had 
come  at  last  when  she  might  proclaim  this  rehabilitation  in 
the  sanctuary  of  justice  ;  but,  by  a  final  fatality,  the  Court 
of  Appeal,  arguing  on  legal  subtleties,  declared  by  its 
decree  of  the  17th  December,  1868,  that  no  cause  had 
been  shown  for  re-opening  the  case,  and  that  Virginie 
Lesurques  had  not  made  good  her  claim  to  revision." 

It  is  as  though  one  were  enthralled  by  some  horrible 
dream,  in  which  a  poor  wretch  is  being  delivered  into 
the  hands  of  the  Furies.  Ever  since  the  fatal  meal,  no 
less  tragic  than  that  of  Thyestes,  which  Lesurques  took 
at  Guesno's  house,  events  have  been  dragging  him  nearer 
and  nearer  the  gulf  that  yawns  at  his  feet ;  while  his 
destiny,  hovering  above  him  like  an  enormous  vulture, 
hides  the  light  from  those  who  approach  him.  And  the 
circles  from  above  press  magically  forward  to  meet  those 
from  below  :  they  advance,  they  contract,  and  then,  unit- 
ing at  last,  their  eddies  blend  and  fasten  upon  what  is 
now  a  corpse. 

Here,  truly,  the  combination   of  murderous  fatalities 
may  well  seem  supernatural ;   and  the  case  is  typical,  it 
283 


*  The  Buried  Temple 

dent  of  the  Parliament  of  Paris,  one  of  the 
most  upright  of  men,  who  first  of  all  is 
suddenly  dismissed  from  his  office,  sees 
his  daughter  die  on  a  dunghill  before  his 
eyes,  his  son  perish  at  the  hands  of  the 
executioner,  and  his  wife  struck  by  light- 
ning ;  while  he  himself  is  accused  of  heresy 
and  sent  to  the  Bastille,  where  he  dies  of 
grief  before  he  is  brought  to  trial. 

The  calamities  that  befell  CEdipus  and 
the  Atrides  are  regarded  by  us  as  im- 
probable and  fabulous ;  and  yet  we  find 
in  contemporary  history  that  fatality  clings 
with  no  less  persistence  to  families  such 
as  the   Stuarts,   the  Colignys,^  etc.,  and 

is  formidable,  it  is  as  symbolic  as  a  myth.  But  there 
can  be  no  doubt  that  analogous  chains  of  circumstances 
reproduce  themselves  daily  in  the  countless  petty  or 
ridiculous  mortifications  of  merely  ordinary  lives,  which 
are  beneath  the  influence  of  an  evil  or  malicious  star. 

^  The  misfortunes   of  the  Stuarts  are  well    known  } 

those  of  the  Colignys  are  less  familiar.     Of  these  last  the 

author  we  have  already  cited  gives  the  following  lucid 

account  :    « Gaspard  de  Coligny,    Marshal   of  France 

284 


Luck 

hounds  to  their  death,  with  what  almost 
seems     personal    vindictiveness,     pitiable 

under  Francis  ist,  was  married  to  the  sister  of  the  Con- 
stable Anne  de  Montmorency.  He  was  reproached 
with  having  delayed  by  half  a  day  his  attack  on  Charles 
the  Fifth,  at  a  lime  when  such  might  have  been  most 
advantageously  offered,  and  with  having  thereby  let  slip  an 
almost  certain  opportunity  of  victory.  One  of  his  sons, 
who  had  been  made  Archbishop  and  Cardinal,  embraced 
Protestantism,  and  was  married  in  his  red  cassock.  He 
fought  against  the  King  at  the  battle  of  St.  Denis,  and 
fled  to  England,  where,  in  the  year  1571,  a  servant  of 
his  attempted  to  poison  him.  He  escaped,  however, 
and  seeking  subsequently  to  return  to  France  was  cap- 
tured at  Rochelle,  condemned  to  death,  and  executed. 
The  Admiral  de  Coligny,  brother  of  the  Cardinal,  was 
reputed  one  of  the  greatest  captains  of  his  time  ;  he  did 
marvels  at  the  defence  of  Saint-Quentin.  The  place, 
however,  was  taken  by  storm,  and  he  was  made  a 
prisoner  of  war.  Having  become  the  real  leader  of  the 
Calvinists,  under  the  Prince  de  Conde,  he  displayed  the 
most  undaunted  courage  and  extraordinary  fertility  of 
resource  ;  neither  his  merit  nor  his  military  skill  was  ever 
called  in  question  ;  and  yet  he  was  uniformly  unsuccess- 
ful in  every  one  of  his  enterprises.  In  1562  he  lost  the 
battle  of  Dreux  to  the  Due  de  Guise  ;  that  of  St.  Denis 
to  the  Constable  de  Montmorency  ;  and  finally  that  of 
Jarnac,  which  was  no  less  fatal  to  his  party.  He  en- 
dured yet  another  reverse  at  Montcontour  in  Poitou }  but 
285 


The  Buried  Temple 

and  innocent  victims  like  Henrietta  of 
England,  daughter  of  Henri  IV.,  Louise 

his  courage  remained  unshaken  ;  his  skill  was  able  to 
parry  the  attacks  of  fortune,  and  he  appeared  more  re- 
doubtable after  his  defeats  than  his  enemies  in  the  midst 
of  their  victories.  Often  wounded,  but  always  impervi- 
ous to  fear,  he  remarked  one  day  quietly  to  his  friends, 
who  wept  as  they  saw  his  blood  flow,  •  Should  not  the  pro- 
fession we  follow  cause  us  to  regard  death  with  the  same 
indifference  as  life  ? '  A  few  days  before  the  Massacre 
of  St.  Bartholomew,  Maurevert  shot  him  with  a  carbine 
from  a  house  in  the  cloister  of  St.  Germain  I'Auxerrois, 
and  wounded  him  dangerously  in  the  right  hand  and  left 
arm.  On  the  eve  of  that  sanguinary  day,  Besme,  at  the 
head  of  a  party  of  cut-throats,  contrived  to  enter  the 
admiral's  house,  and  ran  him  several  times  through 
the  body,  then  flinging  him  out  of  the  window  into  the 
courtyard,  where  he  expired,  it  is  said,  at  the  feet  of  the 
Due  de  Guise.  His  body  was  exposed  for  three  days  to 
the  insults  of  the  mob,  and  Anally  hung  by  the  feet  to 
the  gibbet  of  Montfaucon. 

"  Thus,  though  the  Admiral  de  Coligny  passed  for  the 
greatest  general  of  his  time,  he  was  always  unfortunate 
and  always  defeated  ;  while  the  Due  de  Guise,  his  rival, 
who  had  less  wisdom  but  more  audacity,  and  above  all 
more  confidence  in  his  destiny,  was  able  to  take  his 
enemies  by  surprise  and  render  himself  master  of  events. 
*  Coligny  was  an  honest  man,'  said  the  Abbe  de 
Mably  j  *  Guise  wore  the  mask  of  a  greater  number 
286 


Luck 

de    Bourbon,     Joseph    II.,    and    Marie 
Antoinette. 

And  again,  in  another  category,  what 
shall  we  say  of  the  injustice  —  unintelli- 
gent but  apparently  almost  conscious, 
almost  systematic  and  premeditated  —  of 
games  of  chance,  of  duels,  battles,  storms, 
shipwrecks,  and  fires  ?  Or  of  the  incon- 
ceivable luck  of  a  Chastenet  de  Puysegur 
who,  after  forty  years'  service,  in  the 
course  of  which  he  took  part  in  thirty- 
battles  and  a  hundred  and  twenty  sieges, 
always  in  the  front  rank  and  displaying 
the  most  romantic  courage,  was  never  once 
touched  by  shot  or  steel ;  while  Marshal 
Oudinot  was  wounded  thirty-five  times, 

of  virtues.  CoHgny  was  detested  by  the  people  ;  Guise 
was  their  idol.'  It  is  stated  that  the  Admiral  left  a 
diary,  which  Charles  IX.  read  with  interest,  but  the 
Marshal  de  Retz  had  it  flung  into  the  fire.  Finally,  a 
fatal  destiny  clinging  to  all  who  bore  the  name  of 
Coligny,  the  last  descendant  of  the  family  was  killed 
in  a  duel  by  the  Chevalier  de  Guise." 
287 


The  Buried  Temple 

and  General  Trezel  was  struck  by  a  bullet 
in  every  encounter  ?  What  shall  we  say 
of  the  extraordinary  fortune  of  Lauzun, 
Chamillart,  Casanova,  Chesterfield,  etc., 
or  of  the  inconceivable,  unvarying  pros- 
perity that  attended  the  crimes  of  Sylla, 
Marius,  or  Dionysius  the  Elder,  who,  in 
his  extreme  old  age,  after  an  odious  but 
fantastically  successful  life,  died  of  joy  on 
learning  that  the  Athenians  had  just 
crowned  one  of  his  tragedies  ?  Or,  finally, 
of  Herod,  surnamed  the  Great  or  the 
Ascalonite,  who  swam  in  blood,  murdered 
one  of  his  wives  and  five  of  his  children, 
put  to  death  every  upright  man  who 
might  chance  to  offend  him,  and  yet  was 
fortunate  in  all  his  undertakings  ? 

[6] 

These  famous  examples,  which   might 
be  indefinitely  multiplied,  are  in  truth  no 
more  than  the  abnormal  and  historic  pre- 
288 


Luck 

sentments  of  what  is  shown  to  us  every 
day,  in  a  humbler  but  not  less  emphatic 
fashion,  by  the  thousand  and  one  caprices 
of  propitious  or  contrary  fortune  at  work 
on  the  small  and  ill-lit  stage  of  ordinary 
life. 

Doubtless  we  must,  first  of  all,  when 
closely  examining  such  insolent  prosperity 
or  unvarying  disaster,  attribute  a  royal 
share  to  the  physical  or  moral  causes 
which  are  capable  of  explaining  them. 
Had  we  ourselves  known  Vauvenargues, 
we  should  probably  have  detected  a  cer- 
tain timidity,  irresolution,  or  misplaced 
pride  in  his  character,  whereby  he  was 
disabled  from  allowing  the  opportunity  to 
mature  or  from  seizing  it  with  sufficient 
vigour.  And  Lesurques,  it  may  be,  was 
deficient  in  ability,  in  one  knows  not 
what,  in  that  prodigious  personal  force 
that  one  expects  to  find  in  falsely  accused 
innocence.  Nor  can  it  be  denied  that 
19  289 


The  Buried  Temple 

the  Stuarts,  no  less  than  Joseph  II.  and 
Marie  Antoinette,  were  guilty  of  enor- 
mous blunders  that  invited  disaster  ;  or 
that  Lauzun,  Casanova,  and  Lord  Chester- 
field had  flung  to  the  winds  those  essential 
scruples  that  hinder  the  honest  man.  So 
too  is  it  certain  that  although  the  existence 
of  Sylla,  Marius,  Dionysius  the  Elder, 
and  Herod  the  Ascalonite,  may  have  been 
externally  almost  incomparably  fortunate, 
few  men,  I  fancy,  would  care  to  have 
lurking  within  them  the  strange,  restless, 
blood-stained  phantom,  possessed  neither 
of  thought  nor  of  feeling,  on  which  the 
happiness  must  depend  (if  the  word  happi- 
ness be  indeed  applicable  here)  that  is 
founded  upon  unceasing  crime.  But  this 
deduction  being  made,  and  on  the  most 
reasonable,  most  liberal  scale  (which  will 
become  the  more  generous  as  we  see  more 
of  life  and  understand  it  better,  and  pene- 
trate further  into  the  secrets  of  little  causes 
290 


Luck 

and  great  effects),  we  shall  still  be  forced 
to  admit  that  there  remains  in  these  ob- 
stinately recurring  coincidences,  in  these 
indissoluble  series  of  good  or  evil  fortune, 
these  persistent  runs  of  good  or  bad  luck, 
a  considerable,  often  essential,  and  some- 
times exclusive  share  that  can  be  ascribed 
only  to  the  impenetrable,  incontrovertible 
will  of  a  real  but  unknown  power :  which 
is  known  as  Chance,  Fatality,  Destiny, 
Luck,  Fortune,  good  or  evil  star.  Angel 
with  the  White  Wings,  Angel  with  the 
Black  Wings,  and  by  many  other  names, 
that  vary  in  accordance  with  the  more  or 
less  imaginative,  more  or  less  poetic  genius 
of  centuries  and  peoples.  And  here  we 
have  one  of  the  most  serious,  most  per- 
plexing problems  of  all  those  that  have  to 
be  solved  by  man  before  he  may  legiti- 
mately regard  himself  as  the  principal, 
independent,  and  irrevocable  inhabitant 
of  this  earth. 

291 


The  Buried  Temple 

[7] 

Let  us  reduce  the  problem  to  its  sini' 
plest  terms,  and  submit  it  to  our  reason. 
First,  however,  let  us  consider  whether  it 
affects  man  alone.  We  have  with  us, 
upon  this  curiously  incomprehensible 
globe,  silent  and  faithful  companions  of 
our  existence  ;  and  we  shall  often  find  it 
helpful  to  let  our  eyes  rest  upon  these 
when,  having  reached  certain  altitudes  that 
perhaps  are  illusory,  our  brain  turns  giddy, 
and  inclines  us  too  readily  to  the  idea  that 
the  stars,  the  gods,  or  the  veiled  repre- 
sentatives of  the  sublime  laws  of  the  uni- 
verse, are  concerned  solely  with  us.  These 
poor  brothers  of  our  animal  life,  that  are 
so  calmly,  so  confidently  resigned,  would 
appear  to  know  many  things  that  we  have 
forgotten  ;  they  are  the  tranquil  custodians 
of  the  secret  that  we  seek  so  anxiously ! 
It  is  evident  that  animals,  and  notably 
292 


Luck 

domestic  animals,  have  also  a  kind  of 
destiny.  They  too  know  what  prolonged 
and  gratuitous  happiness  means ;  they 
also  have  encountered  the  persistent  mis- 
fortune for  which  no  cause  can  be  found. 
They  have  the  same  right  as  we  to  speak 
of  their  star,  their  good  or  bad  luck,  their 
prosperity  or  disaster.  Compare  the  fate 
of  the  cab-horse,  that  ends  its  days  at  the 
knacker's,  after  having  passed  through 
the  hands  of  a  hundred  brutal  and  name- 
less masters,  with  that  of  the  thoroughbred 
which  dies  of  old  age  in  the  stable  of  a 
kindhearted  master ;  and  from  the  point 
of  view  of  justice  (unless  we  accept  the 
Buddhist  theory,  that  life  in  this  world  is 
the  reward  or  punishment  of  an  anterior 
existence)  explanation  is  as  completely 
lacking  as  in  the  case  of  the  man  whom 
chance  has  reduced  to  poverty  or  raised  to 
wealth.  There  is  in  Flanders  a  breed 
of  draught-dogs  upon  which  destiny 
293 


The  Buried  Temple 

alternatively  lavishes  her  favour  and  her 
spite.  Some  will  be  bought  by  a  butcher, 
and  lead  a  magnificent  life.  The  work  is 
trifling :  in  the  morning,  harnessed  four 
abreast,  they  draw  a  light  cart  to  the 
slaughter-house,  and  at  night,  galloping 
joyously,  triumphantly,  home  through 
the  narrow  streets  of  the  ancient  towns 
with  their  tiny,  lit-up  gables,  bring  it 
back  overflowing  with  meat.  Between- 
times  there  is  leisure,  and  marvellous 
leisure,  among  the  rats  and  the  waste  of 
slaughter-house.  They  are  copiously  fed, 
they  are  fat,  they  shine  like  seals,  and 
taste  in  its  fulness  the  only  happiness 
dreamed  of  by  the  naive,  ferreting  instinct 
of  the  honest  dog.  But  their  unfortunate 
brethren  of  the  same  litter,  that  the  lame 
sand-pedlar  buys,  or  the  old  collector  of 
h*ousehold  refuse,  or  the  needy  peasant 
with  his  great  cruel  clogs  —  these  are 
chained  to  heavy  carts  or  shapeless  bar- 
294 


Luck 

rows ;  they  are  filthy,  mangey,  hairless, 
emaciated,  starving  ;  and  follow  till  they 
die  the  circles  of  a  hell  into  which  they 
were  thrust  by  a  few  coppers  dropped 
into  some  horny  palm.  And,  in  a  world 
less  directly  subject  to  man,  there  must 
evidently  be  partridges,  pheasr^nts,  deer, 
hares,  which  have  no  luck,  which  never 
escape  the  gun;  while  others,  one  knows 
not  how  or  why,  emerge  unscathed  from 
every  battue. 

They,  therefore,  are  exposed,  like  our- 
selves, to  incontestable  injustice.  But  it 
does  not  occur  to  us,  when  considering 
their  hardships,  to  set  all  the  gods  in 
motion  or  seek  explanation  from  the 
mysterious  powers  ;  and  yet  what  happens 
to  them  may  well  be  no  more  than  the 
image,  naively  simplified,  of  what  happens 
to  us.  It  is  true  that  we  play  the  precise 
part,  in  their  case,  of  the  mysterious 
powers  that  we  seek  in  our  own.  But 
295 


The  Buried  Temple 

what  right  have  we  to  expect  from  these 
last  more  consciousness,  more  intelligent 
justice,  than  we  ourselves  show  in  our 
dealings  with  animals  ?  And  in  any 
event,  if  this  instance  shall  only  have  de- 
prived chance  of  a  little  of  its  useless 
prestige  and  have  proportionately  aug- 
mented our  spirit  of  initiative  and  struggle, 
there  will  be  a  gain  the  importance  of 
which  is  by  no  means  to  be  despised, 

[8] 
Still  further  allowance  must  therefore 
be  made;  but  yet  there  undoubtedly  re- 
mains —  at  least  as  far  as  the  more  com- 
plex life  of  man  is  concerned  —  a  cause  of 
good  or  evil  fortune,  as  yet  untouched  by 
our  explanations,  in  the  often  visible  will 
of  chance  —  which  one  might  almost  call 
the  "  small  change  "  of  fatality.  We  know 
—  and  this  is  one  of  those  formless  but 
fundamental  ideas  on  the  laws  of  life  that 
396 


Luck 

the  experience  of  thousands  of  years  has 
turned  into  a  kind  of  instinct  —  we  know 
that  men  exist  who,  other  things  being 
equal,  are  "  lucky  "  or  "  unlucky."  Cir- 
cumstances permitted  me  to  follow  very 
closely  the  career  of  a  friend  of  mine  who 
was  dogged  by  persistent  ill-fortune.  I 
do  not  mean  to  imply  thereby  that  his  life 
was  unhappy.  It  is  even  remarkable  that 
the  malign  influences  always  respected  the 
broad  lines  of  his  veritable  happiness ; 
probably  because  these  were  well  guarded. 
For  he  had  in  him  a  strong  moral  exist- 
ence, profound  thoughts  and  hopes,  feel- 
ings and  convictions.  He  was  well  aware 
that  these  were  possessions  that  fortune 
could  not  touch  ;  which  indeed  could  not 
be  destroyed  without  his  consent.  Destiny 
is  not  invincible ;  through  life's  very 
centre  runs  a  great  inward  canal,  which  we 
have  the  power  to  turn  towards  happiness 
or  sorrow  ;  although  its  ramifications,  that 
397 


The  Buried  Temple 

extend  over  our  days,  and  the  thousand 
tributaries  that  flow  in  from  external  haz- 
ards, are  all  independent  of  our  will. 

It  is  thus  that  a  beautiful  river,  stream- 
ing down  from  the  heights,  and  ashine 
with  magnificent  glaciers,  passes  at  length 
through  plains  and  through  cities,  whence 
it  receives  only  poisonous  water.  For  an 
instant  the  river  is  troubled ;  and  we  fear 
lest  it  lose,  and  never  recover  again,  the 
image  of  the  pure  blue  sky  that  the  crystal 
fountains  had  lent:  the  image  that  seemed 
its  soul,  and  the  deep  and  the  limpid  ex- 
pression of  its  great  strength.  But  if  we 
rejoin  it,  down  yonder,  beneath  those  great 
trees,  we  find  that  it  has  already  forgotten 
the  foulness  of  the  gutters.  It  has  caught 
the  azure  again  in  its  transparent  waves ; 
and  flows  on  to  the  sea,  as  clear  as  it  was 
on  the  days  when  it  first  smilingly  leapt 
from  its  source  on  the  mountains. 

And  so,  as  regards  this  friend  of  mine, 
398 


Luck 

although  forced  more  than  once  to  shed 
tears,  they  were  at  least  not  of  the  kind 
that  memory  never  forgets,  not  of  those 
that  fall  from  our  eyes  as  we  mourn  our 
own  death.  Every  failure,  the  inevitable 
disappointment  once  over,  served  only  to 
knit  him  the  closer  to  his  secret  happiness, 
to  affirm  this  within  him,  and  draw  round 
about  it  a  more  sombre  outline,  that  it 
might  thereby  appear  the  more  precious 
and  ardent  and  certain.  But  no  sooner 
had  he  quitted  this  charmed  enclosure 
than  hostile  incidents  vied  with  each  other 
in  their  attacks  upon  him.  As  for  instance 
—  he  was  a  very  good  fencer :  he  had 
three  duels,  and  was  wounded  each  time 
by  a  less  skilful  adversary.  If  he  went 
on  board  ship,  the  voyage  would  rarely 
be  prosperous.  Whatever  undertaking 
he  put  money  into  was  sure  to  turn  out 
badly.     A   judicial    error,   into   which    a 

whole  series  of  curiously  malevolent  cir- 
299 


The  Buried  Temple 

cumstances  dragged  him,  was  productive 
of  long  and  serious  trouble.  Further, 
although  his  face  was  agreeable,  and  the 
expression  of  his  eyes  loyal  and  frank,  he 
was  not  what  one  calls  "  sympathetic  " : 
he  did  not  arouse  at  first  sight  that  spon- 
taneous affection  that  we  often  give,  with- 
out knowing  why,  to  the  unknown  who 
passes,  to  an  enemy  even.  Nor  was  he 
more  fortunate  in  his  affections.  Of  a 
loving  nature,  and  infinitely  worthier  of 
being  loved  than  most  of  those  to  whom 
the  chance-ridden  heart  of  women  sacri- 
ficed him  —  here  again  he  met  with 
nothing  but  treachery,  deception,  and  sor- 
row. He  went  his  way,  extricating  himself 
as  best  he  could  from  the  paltry  snares 
that  malicious  fortune  prepared  at  every 
step ;  nor  was  he  discouraged  or  deeply 
saddened,  only  somewhat  surprised  at  so 
strange  a  persistence;  until  at  last  there 
came  the  great,  and  solitary  good-fortune 
300 


Luck 

of  his  life :  a  love  that  was  the  complement 
of  the  one  that  was  eager  within  him,  a 
love  that  was  complete,  passionate,  exclu- 
sive, unalterable.  And  from  that  moment 
it  was  as  though  he  had  come  under  the 
influence  of  another  star,  the  beneficent 
rays  of  which  were  blending  with  his  own  : 
vexatious  events  grew  slowly  remoter, 
fewer,  warier  of  attacking  him,  tardier  in 
their  approach.  They  seemed  reluctantly 
to  abandon  their  habit  of  selecting  him  as 
their  victim.  He  actually  saw  his  luck 
turn.  And  now  that  he  has  gone  back,  as 
it  were,  into  the  indifferent  and  neutral  at- 
mosphere of  chance  common  to  most  men, 
he  smiles  when  he  remembers  the  time 
when  every  gesture  of  his  was  watched  by 
the  invisible  enemy,  and  aroused  a  danger. 

[9] 

Let  us  not   look   to   the  gods  for  an 
explanation  of  these  phenomena.     Until 
301 


The  Buried  Temple 

these  gods  shall    have  clearly   explained 
themselves  there  is  nothing  that  they  can 
explain  for  us.      And  destiny,  which    is 
merely  the  god  of  which  we  know  least, 
has  less  right  than  any  of  the  others  to 
intervene  and  cry  to  us,  as  it  does  from 
the  depths  of  its  inscrutable  night,"  It  is  I 
who  so  willed  it ! "     Nor  let  us  invoke  the 
illimitable  law  of  the  universe,  the  inten- 
tions of  history,  the  will  of  the  worlds,  the 
justice  of  the  stars.     These  powers  exist : 
we  submit  to  them,  as  we  submit  to  the 
might  of  the  sun.     But  they  act  without 
knowing  us ;  and  within  the  wide  circle 
of  their  influence  there  remains  to  us  still 
a  liberty  that  is  probably  immense.    They 
have  better  work  on  hand  than  to  be  for-  • 
ever  bending  over  us  to  lift  a  blade  of 
grass  or  drop  a  leaf  in  the  little  paths  of 
our  ant-hill.     Since  we  ourselves  are  here 
the  parties   concerned,   it  is,    I    imagine, 
within   ourselves    that    the   key   of  the 
302 


Luck 

mystery  shall  be  found ;  for  it  is  probable 
that  every  creature  carries  within  him  the 
best  solution  of  the  problem  that  he  pre- 
sents. Within  us,  underlying  the  con- 
scious existence  that  our  reason  and  will 
control,  is  a  profounder  existence,  one  side 
of  which  connects  with  a  past  beyond  the 
record  of  history,  the  other  with  a  future 
that  thousands  of  years  cannot  exhaust. 
We  may  safely  conceive  that  all  the  gods 
lie  hidden  within  it,  and  that  those  where- 
with we  have  peopled  the  earth  and  the 
planets  will  emerge,  one  by  one,  in  order 
to  give  it  a  name  and  a  form  that  our 
imagination  may  understand.  And  as 
man's  vision  grows  clearer,  as  he  shows 
less  desire  for  image  and  symbol,  so  will 
the  number  of  these  names,  the  number 
of  these  forms,  tend  to  diminish.  He  will 
slowly  arrive  at  the  stage  when  there  shall 
be  one  only  that  he  will  proclaim,  or 
reserve ;  when  it  shall  be  revealed  to  him 
303 


The  Buried  Temple 

that  this  last  form,  this  last  name,  is  truly 

no  more  than  the  last  image  of  a  power 

whose    throne    was   always   within    him. 

Then  will  the  gods  that  had  gone  forth 

from  us  be  found  again  in  ourselves ;  and 

it  is   there  that   we   will    question    them 

to-day. 

[lo] 

I  hold  that  it  is  in  this  unconscious  life 
of  ours,  in  this  existence  that  is  so  vast,  so 
divine,  so  inexhaustible  and  unfathomable, 
that  we  must  seek  for  the  explanation  of 
fortunate  or  contrary  chances.  Within 
us  is  a  being  that  is  our  veritable  ego, 
our  first-born :  immemorial,  illimitable, 
universal,  and  probably  immortal.  Our 
intellect,  which  is  merely  a  kind  of  phos- 
phorescence that  plays  on  this  inner  sea, 
has  as  yet  but  faint  knowledge  of  it.  But 
our  intellect  is  gradually  learning  that 
every  secret  of  the  human  phenomena  it 
has  hitherto  not  understood  must  reside 
304 


Luck 

there,  and  there  alone.  This  unconscious 
being  lives  on  another  plane  than  our 
intellect,  in  another  world.  It  knows 
nothing  of  Time  and  Space,  the  two  for- 
midable but  illusory  walls  between  which 
our  reason  must  flow  or  be  hopelessly 
lost  in  the  desert.  It  knows  no  proximity, 
it  knows  no  distance;  past  and  future 
concern  it  not,  or  the  resistance  of  matter. 
It  is  familiar  with  all  things ;  there  is 
nothing  it  cannot  do.  To  this  force,  this 
knowledge,  we  have  indeed  at  all  times 
accorded  a  certain  varying  recognition ; 
we  have  given  names  to  its  manifestations, 
we  have  called  them  instinct,  soul,  uncon- 
sciousness, sub-consciousness,  reflex  action, 
presentiment,  intuition,  etc.  We  credit 
it  more  especially  with  the  indeterminate 
and  often  prodigious  force  contained  in 
those  of  our  nerves  that  do  not  directly 
serve  to  produce  our  will  and  our  reason  : 
a  force  that  would  appear  to  be  the  very 
^  305 


The  Buried  Temple 

fluid  of  life.  Its  nature  is  probably  more 
or  less  the  same  in  all  men ;  but  it  has 
very  different  methods  of  communicating 
with  the  intellect.  In  some  men  this  un- 
known principle  is  enshrined  at  so  great  a 
depth  that  it  concerns  itself  solely  with 
physical  functions  and  the  permanence  of 
the  species ;  whereas  in  others  it  would 
seem  to  be  forever  on  the  alert,  rising 
again  and  again  to  the  surface  of  external 
and  conscious  life,  which  its  fairy-like 
presence  quickens ;  intervening  at  every 
instant,  warning,  deciding,  counselling, 
blending  with  most  of  the  essential  facts 
of  a  career.  Whence  comes  this  faculty  ? 
There  are  no  fixed  or  certain  laws.  We 
do  not  detect,  for  instance,  any  con- 
stant relation  between  the  activity  of  the 
unconsciousness  and  the  development  of 
the  intellect.  This  activity  obeys  rules 
of  which  we  know  nothing.  So  far  as  we 
at  present  can  tell,  it  would  seem  to  be 
306 


Luck 

purely  accidental.  We  discover  it  in  one 
man,  and  not  in  another ;  nor  have  we 
any  clue  that  shall  help  us  to  guess  at  the 
reason  of  this  difference. 

[II] 

The  probable  course  pursued  by  fortu- 
nate or  contrary  chances  may  well  be  as 
follows.  A  happy  or  untoward  event, 
that  has  sprung  from  the  profound  reces- 
ses of  great  and  eternal  laws,  arises  before 
us  and  completely  blocks  the  way.  It 
stands  motionless  there :  immovable,  in- 
evitable, disproportionate.  It  pays  no 
heed  to  us  ;  it  has  not  come  on  our  ac- 
count, but  for  itself,  because  of  itself.  It 
ignores  us  completely.  It  is  we  who  ap- 
proach the  event :  we  who,  having  arrived 
within  the  sphere  of  its  influence,  will 
either  fly  from  it  or  face  it,  try  a  circuitous 
route  or  fare  boldly  onwards.  Let  us  as- 
sume that  the  event  is  disastrous :  fire, 
307 


The  Buried  Temple 

death,  disease,  or  a  somewhat  abnormal 
form  of  accident  or  distress.  It  waits  there, 
invisible,  indifferent,  blind,  but  perfect  and 
unalterable;  and  still  as  yet  it  is  only  poten- 
tial. It  exists  entire,  but  only  in  the  future ; 
and  for  us,  whose  intellect  and  conscious- 
ness are  served  by  senses  unable  to  per- 
ceive things  otherwise  than  through  the 
succession  of  time,  it  is  still  as  though  it 
were  not.  Let  us  still  be  more  precise; 
let  us  take  the  case  of  a  shipwreck.  The 
ship  that  must  perish  has  not  yet  left  the 
port ;  the  rock  or  the  shoal  that  shall 
rend  it  sleeps  peacefully  beneath  the 
waves :  the  storm  that  shall  burst  forth  at 
the  end  of  the  month  slumbers  far  beyond 
our  gaze,  in  the  secret  of  the  skies. 
Normally,  were  nothing  written,  had  the 
catastrophe  not  already  taken  place  in  the 
future,  fifty  passengers  would  have  arrived 
from  five  or  six  different  countries,  and 
have  duly  gone  on  board.  But  destiny 
308 


Luck 

has  clearly  marked  the  vessel  for  its  own. 
She  must  most  certainly  perish.  And  for 
months  past,  perhaps  for  years,  a  myster- 
ious selection  has  been  at  work  among  the 
passengers  who  were  to  have  departed 
upon  the  same  day.  It  is  possible  that 
out  of  fifty  who  had  originally  intended 
to  sail,  only  twenty  will  cross  the  gangway 
at  the  moment  of  lifting  the  anchor.*     It 

^  It  is  a  remarkable  and  constant  fact  that  great  catas- 
trophes claim  infinitely  fewer  victims  than  the  most 
reasonable  probabilities  might  have  led  one  to  suppose. 
At  the  last  moment  a  fortuitous  or  exceptional  circum- 
stance is  almost  always  found  to  have  kept  away  half, 
and  sometimes  two-thirds,  of  the  persons  who  were 
threatened  by  the  still  invisible  danger.  A  steamer  that 
goes  to  the  bottom  has  generally  fewer  passengers  on 
board  than  would  have  been  the  case  had  she  not  been 
destined  to  go  down.  Two  trains  that  collide,  an  ex- 
press that  falls  over  a  precipice,  etc.,  carry  less  travellers 
than  they  would  on  a  day  when  nothing  is  to  happen. 
Should  a  bridge  collapse,  the  accident  will  generally  be 
found  to  occur,  in  defiance  of  all  probability,  at  the  mo- 
ment the  crowd  has  just  left  it.  In  the  case  of  fires  in 
theatres  and  other  public  places,  things  unfortunately  hap- 
pen otherwise.     But  there,  as  we  know,  the  principal 

309 


The  Buried  Temple 

is  even  possible  that  not  a  single  one  of 
the  fifty  will  listen  to  the  insistent  claims 

danger  does  not  lie  in  the  fire,  but  in  the  panic  of  the 

terror-stricken  crowd.  Again,  a  fire-damp  explosion  will 
usually  occur  at  a  time  when  the  number  of  miners  inside 
the  mine  is  appreciably  inferior  to  the  number  that  would 
habitually  be  there.  Similarly,  when  a  powder-factory 
is  blown  up,  the  majority  of  the  workmen,  who  would 
otherwise  all  have  perished,  will  be  found  to  have  left  the 
mill  for  some  trifling,  but  providential,  reason.  So  true 
is  this,  that  the  almost  unvarying  remark,  that  we  read 
every  day  in  the  papers,  has  become  familiar  and  hack- 
neyed, as  "A  catastrophe  which  might  have  assumed 
terrible  proportions  was  fortunately  confined,  thanks  to 
such  and  such  a  circumstance,  etc.,  etc.,"  or  "One  shud- 
ders to  think  what  might  have  happened  had  the  accident 
occurred  a  moment  sooner,  when  all  the  workmen,  all  the 
passengers,  etc."  Is  this  the  clemency  of  Chance  ?  We 
are  becoming  ever  less  inclined  to  credit  it  with  a  person- 
ality, with  design  or  intelligence.  There  is  more  reason 
in  the  supposition  that  something  in  man  had  divined  the 
disaster  ;  that  an  obscure  but  unfailing  instinct  had  pre- 
served a  great  number  of  people  from  a  danger  that  was 
on  the  point  of  taking  shape,  of  assuming  the  imminent 
and  imperious  form  of  the  inevitable,  and  that  their  un- 
consciousness, taking  alarm,  was  seized  with  hidden 
panic  ;  which  manifested  itself  outwardly  in  a  caprice,  a 
whim,  some  puerile  and  inconsistent  incident,  that  was 
yet  irresistible  and  became  the  means  of  salvation. 
310 


Luck 

of  the  circumstance  that,  but  for  the  dis- 
aster ahead,  would  have  rendered  their 
departure  imperative,  and  that  their  place 
will  be  taken  by  twenty  or  thirty  others 
in  whom  the  voice  of  Chance  does  not 
speak  with  a  similar  power.  Here  we 
touch  the  profoundest  depths  of  the  pro- 
foundest  of  human  enigmas ;  and  the 
hypothesis  necessarily  falters.  But  is  it 
not  more  reasonable,  in  the  fictitious  case 
before  us  —  wherein  we  merely  thrust 
into  prominence  what  is  of  constant  occur- 
rence in  the  more  obscure  conjunctures  of 
daily  life  —  to  regard  both  decision  and 
action  as  emanating  from  our  unconscious- 
ness, rather  than  from  doubtful,  and  dis- 
tant, gods  ?  Our  unconsciousness  is  aware 
of  the  catastrophe,  —  it  must  be ;  our  un- 
consciousness sees  it ;  for  it  knows  neither 
time  nor  space,  and  the  disaster  is  therefore 
happening  as  actually  before  its  eyes  as 
before  the  eyes  of  the  eternal  powers. 
311 


The  Buried  Temple 

The  mode  of  prescience  matters  but  little. 
Out  of  the  fifty  travellers  who  have  been 
warned,  two  or  three  will  have  had  a  real 
presentiment  of  the  danger ;  these  will  be 
the  ones  in  whom  unconsciousness  is  free 
and  untrammelled,  and  therefore  more 
readily  able  to  attain  the  first,  and  still 
obscure,  layers  of  intellect.  The  others 
suspect  nothing  :  they  inveigh  against  the 
inexplicable  obstacles  and  delays ;  they 
strain  every  nerve  to  arrive  in  time  ;  but 
their  departure  becomes  impossible.  They 
fall  ill,  take  a  wrong  road,  change  their 
plans,  meet  with  some  insignificant  adven- 
ture, have  a  quarrel,  a  love-affair,  a  mo- 
ment of  idleness  or  forgetfulness,  which 
detains  them  in  spite  of  themselves.  To 
the  others  it  will  never  have  even  occurred 
to  sail  on  the  ill-starred  boat,  although 
this  be  the  one  they  should  logically,  in- 
evitably, have  been  compelled  to  choose. 
But  the  efforts  that  their  unconsciousness 
3" 


Luck 

has  put  forth  to  save  them  have  their 
workings  so  deep  down  that  most  of  these 
men  will  have  no  idea  that  they  owe  their 
life  to  a  fortunate  chance ;  and  they  will 
honestly  believe  that  they  never  intended 
to  sail  by  the  ship  that  the  powers  of  the 
sea  had  claimed. 

[la] 

As  for  those  who  punctually  make 
their  appearance  at  the  fatal  tryst,  they 
belong  to  the  tribe  of  the  unlucky.  They 
are  the  more  unfortunate  race  of  our  race. 
When  the  rest  all  fly,  they  alone  remain 
in  their  places.  When  others  retreat, 
they  advance  boldly.  They  infallibly 
travel  by  the  train  that  shall  leave  the 
rails,  they  pass  underneath  the  tower  at 
the  exact  moment  of  its  collapse,  they 
enter  the  house  in  which  the  fire  is 
smouldering,  cross  the  forest  on  which 
lightning  shall  fall,  intrust  all  they  have 
313 


The  Buried  Temple 

to  the  banker  who  means  to  abscond. 
They  love  the  one  woman  on  earth  whom 
they  should  have  avoided,  they  make  the 
gesture  they  should  not  have  made,  they 
do  the  thing  they  should  not  have  done. 
But  when  fortune  beckons  and  the  others 
are  hastening,  urged  by  the  deep  voice  of 
benevolent  powers,  they  pass  by,  not 
hearing ;  and,  vouchsafed  no  advice  or 
warning  but  that  of  their  intellect,  the 
very  wise  old  guide  whose  purblind  eyes 
see  only  the  tiny  paths  at  the  foot  of  the 
mountain,  they  go  astray  in  a  world  that 
human  reason  has  not  yet  understood. 
These  men  have  surely  the  right  to  ex- 
claim against  destiny ;  and  yet  not  on  the 
grounds  that  they  would  prefer.  They 
have  the  right  to  ask  why  it  has  withheld 
from  them  the  watchful  guard  who  warns 
their  brethren.  But  this  reproach  once 
made  —  and  it  is  the  cardinal  reproach 
against  irreducible  injustice  —  they  have 
3'4 


Luck 

no  further  cause  of  complaint.  The  uni- 
verse is  not  hostile  to  them.  Calamities 
do  not  pursue  them ;  it  is  they  who  go 
towards  calamity.  Things  from  without 
wish  them  no  ill ;  the  mischief  comes  from 
themselves.  The  misfortune  they  meet 
has  not  been  lying  in  wait  for  them  ;  they 
selected  it  for  their  own.  With  them,  as 
with  all  men,  events  are  posted  along  the 
course  of  their  years,  like  goods  in  a  bazaar, 
that  stand  ready  for  the  customer  who 
shall  buy  them.  No  one  deceives  them  ; 
they  merely  deceive  themselves.  They 
are  in  no  wise  persecuted ;  but  their  un- 
conscious soul  fails  to  perform  its  duty. 
Is  it  less  adroit  than  the  others ;  is  it 
less  eager?  Does  it  slumber  hopelessly 
in  the  depths  of  its  secular  prison,  and 
can  no  amount  of  will  power  arouse 
it  from  its  fatal  lethargy,  and  force  the 
redoubtable  doors  that  lead  from  the 
life  that  unconsciously  is  aware  of  all 
315 


The  Buried  Temple 

things   to  the  intelligent  life  that  knows 
nothing  ? 

[•3] 
A  friend  in  whose  presence  I  was  dis- 
cussing these  matters  said  to  me  yester- 
day :  "  Life,  whose  questions  are  more 
searching  than  those  of  the  philosophers, 
will  this  very  day  compel  me  to  add  a 
somewhat  curious  problem  to  those  you 
have  stated.  I  am  wondering  what  the 
result  will  be  when  two  Mucks*  —  in 
other  words,  two  unconsciousnesses,  of 
which  one  is  adroit  and  fortunate,  the 
other  inept  and  bungling  —  meet  and  in 
some  measure  blend  in  the  same  venture, 
the  same  undertaking?  Which  will 
triumph  over  the  other?  I  soon  shall 
know.  This  afternoon  I  propose  to  take 
a  step  that  will  be  of  supreme  importance 
to  the  person  I  value  above  all  others 
in  this  world.  Her  entire  future  may 
316 


Luck 

almost  be  said  to  depend  upon  it,  her 
exterior  happiness,  the  possibility  of  her 
living  in  accordance  with  her  nature  and 
her  rights.  Now  to  me  chance  has  al- 
ways been  a  faithful  and  far-seeing  friend, 
and  as  I  glance  over  my  past  and  review 
the  five  or  six  decisive  moments  which,  as 
with  all  men,  were  the  golden  pivots  on 
which  fortune  turned,  I  am  induced  to 
believe  in  my  star,  and  am  morally  certain 
that  if  I  alone  were  concerned  in  the  step 
I  am  taking  to-day,  it  would  be  bound 
to  succeed,  because  I  am  *  lucky.'  But 
the  person  in  whose  behalf  I  am  acting 
has  never  been  fortunate.  Her  intellect 
is  remarkably  subtle  and  profound,  her 
will  is  a  thousand  times  stronger  and 
more  balanced  than  my  own ;  but,  with 
all  this,  one  can  only  believe  that  she 
possesses  a  foolish  or  malignant  uncon- 
sciousness, which  has  persistently,  ruth- 
lessly, exposed  her  to  act  after  act  of 
317 


The  Buried  Temple 

injustice,  dishonesty,  and  treachery,  and 
has  robbed  her  again  and  again  of  her 
due,  and  compelled  her  to  travel  the  path 
of  disastrous  coincidence.  Be  sure  that 
it  would  have  forced  her  to  embark  on 
the  ship  that  you  speak  of.  I  ask  my- 
self, therefore,  what  attitude  will  my  vigi- 
lant, thoughtful  unconsciousness  adopt 
towards  this  indolent  and  sinning  brother, 
in  whose  name  it  will  have  to  act,  whose 
place  as  it  were  it  will  take  ? 

"  How  and  where  is  the  momentous 
decision  being  at  this  moment  arrived  at, 
in  search  of  which  I  shall  so  soon  set 
forth?  What  power  is  it  that  now,  at 
this  very  moment,  while  I  am  speaking 
to  you,  balances  the  pros  and  cons,  and 
decrees  the  happiness  or  sorrow  of  the 
woman  I  represent  ?  From  which  sphere, 
or  perhaps  immemorial  virtue,  from  what 
hidden  spirit  or  invisible  star,  will  the 
weight  descend  that  shall  incline  the  scale 
318 


Luck 

to  light  or  to  darkness  ?  Outward  ap- 
pearances tell  us  that  decision  rests  with 
the  will,  the  reason,  the  interest  of  the 
parties  engaged;  in  reality  it  often  is 
otherwise.  When  one  finds  oneself  thus 
face  to  face  with  the  problem  which 
directly  affects  a  person  we  love,  it  no 
longer  appears  quite  so  simple ;  our  eyes 
open  wider,  and  we  throw  a  startled,  anx- 
ious, in  a  sense  almost  a  virgin  glance 
upon  all  this  unknown  that  leads  us,  and 
that  we  are  compelled  to  obey. 

"I  take  this  step  therefore  with  more 
emotion,  I  put  forth  more  zeal  and  vigour, 
than  if  it  were  my  own  life,  my  own 
happiness,  that  stood  in  peril.  She  for 
whom  I  am  acting  is  indeed  *  more  I  than 
I  am  myself,'  and  for  a  long  time  past  her 
happiness  has  been  the  source  of  mine. 
Of  this  both  my  heart  and  my  reason  are 
fully  aware,  but  does  my  unconsciousness 
know  ?  My  reason  and  heart  that  form 
319 


The  Buried  Temple 

my  consciousness,  are  barely  thirty  years 
old;  my  unconscious  soul,  that  is  still 
reminiscent  of  primitive  secrets,  may  well 
date  centuries  back.  Its  evolution  is  very 
deliberate.  It  is  as  slow  in  its  movements 
as  a  world  that  turns  in  time  without  end. 
It  will  probably  therefore  not  yet  have 
learned  that  a  second  existence  has  linked 
itself  to  mine,  and  completely  absorbed  it. 
How  many  years  must  elapse  before  the 
great  news  shall  penetrate  to  its  retreat  ? 
Here  again  we  note  its  diversity,  its  in- 
equality. In  one  man,  perhaps,  uncon- 
sciousness will  immediately  recognise  what 
is  taking  place  in  his  heart ;  in  another,  it 
will  very  tardily  lend  itself  to  the  phe- 
nomena of  reason.  There  is  a  love,  again, 
such  as  that  of  the  mother  for  her  child, 
in  which  it  moves  in  advance  of  both 
heart  and  reason.  Only  after  a  very  long 
time  does  the  unconscious  soul  of  a 
mother  separate  itself  from  that  of  her 
320 


Luck 

children  ;  it  watches  over  these  at  first 
with  far  more  zeal  and  solicitude  than 
over  the  mother.  But,  in  a  love  like 
mine,  who  shall  say  whether  my  uncon- 
sciousness has  gathered  that  this  love  is 
more  essential  to  me  than  my  life  ?  I 
myself  believe  that  it  is  satisfied  that  the 
step  I  propose  to  take  in  no  wise  con- 
cerns me.  It  will  not  appear ;  it  will  not 
intervene.  At  the  very  moment  when  I 
shall  be  feverishly  displaying  all  the 
energy  I  possess,  when  I  shall  be  striving 
for  victory  more  keenly  than  were  my 
salvation  at  stake,  it  will  be  tending  its 
own  mysterious  affairs  deep  down  in  its 
shadowy  dwelling.  Were  I  seeking 
justice  for  myself,  it  would  already  be  on 
the  alert.  It  would  know,  perhaps,  that 
I  had  better  do  nothing  to-day.  I  should 
probably  not  have  the  slightest  idea  of  its 
intervention  ;  but  it  would  raise  some  un- 
foreseen obstacle.     I  should  fall  ill ;  catch 

21  321 


The  Buried  Temple 

a  bad  cold,  be  prevented  by  some  second- 
ary event  from  arriving  at  the  unpropi- 
tious  hour.  Then,  when  I  was  actually  in 
the  presence  of  the  man  who  held  my 
destiny  in  his  hands,  my  vigilant  friend 
would  spread  its  wings  over  me,  its  breath 
would  inspire  me,  its  light  would  dispel 
my  darkness.  It  would  dictate  to  me  the 
words  that  I  must  say;  they  would  be 
the  only  words  that  could  meet  the  secret 
objections  of  the  master  of  my  Fate.  It 
would  regulate  my  attitude,  my  silence, 
my  gestures ;  it  would  endow  me  with 
confidence,  the  nameless  influence,  which 
often  will  govern  the  decisions  of  men  far 
more  than  the  reasons  of  reason  or  the 
eloquence  of  interest.  But  here  I  am 
solely  afraid  that  my  unconsciousness  will 
do  none  of  these  things.  It  will  remain 
perfectly  passive.  It  will  not  appear  on 
the  familiar  threshold.  In  its  obtuseness, 
impervious  to  the  fact  that  my  life  has 
322 


Luck 

ceased  to  be  self-contained,  it  will  act 
in  accordance  with  its  ancient  traditions, 
with  those  that  have  ruled  it  these  hun- 
dreds of  years  ;  it  will  persist  in  regarding 
this  matter  as  one  that  does  not  concern 
me,  and  will  believe  that  in  helping  my 
failure  it  will  be  doing  me  service  ;  where- 
as in  truth  it  will  afflict  me  more  griev- 
ously, cause  me  more  sorrow,  than  if  it 
were  to  betray  me  at  the  approach  of 
death.  I  shall  be  importing  therefore, 
into  this  affair,  only  the  palest  reflection, 
a  kind  of  phantom,  of  my  own  luck  ;  and 
I  ask  myself  with  dread  whether  this  will 
suffice  to  counterbalance  the  contrary 
fortune  which  I  have,  as  it  were,  assumed, 
and  which  I  represent." 

[h] 

Some  days  later  my  friend  informed  me 
that  his  action  had  been  unsuccessful.     It 
may  be  that  this  reverse  was  only  due  to 
323 


The  Buried  Temple 

chance  or  to  his  own  want  of  confidence. 
For  the  confidence  which  sees  success 
ahead  pursues  it  with  a  pertinacity  and  re- 
source of  which  hesitation  and  doubt  are 
incapable  :  nor  is  it  troubled  by  any  of 
those  involuntary  weaknesses  which  give 
so  great  an  advantage  to  the  adversary's 
instinct.  And  there  may  probably  be 
much  truth  also  in  his  manner  of  depict- 
ing unconsciousness.  For  truly  there  are 
depths  in  us  at  which  unconsciousness  and 
confidence  would  seem  to  blend ;  and  it 
becomes  difficult  to  say  where  the  first 
begins,  or  the  second  leaves  oflP. 

We  will  not  pursue  this  too  subtle  in- 
quiry, but  rather  consider  the  other,  and 
more  direct,  questions  that  life  is  ever 
putting  to  us  concerning  one  of  its  great- 
est problems — chance.  This  possesses 
what  may  be  called  a  daily  interest.  It 
asks  us,  for  instance,  what  attitude  we 
should  adopt  towards  men  who  are  incon- 
334 


Luck 

testably  unlucky ;  men  whose  evil  star  has 
such  pernicious  power  that  it  infallibly 
brings  disaster  to  whatever  comes  within 
the  range  —  often  a  very  wide  one  —  of 
its  baneful  influence.  Ought  we  unhesi- 
tatingly to  fly  from  such  men.  as  Dr. 
Foissac  advises  ?  Yes,  doubtless,  if  their 
misfortunes  arise  from  an  imprudent  and 
unduly  hazardous  spirit,  a  heedless,  quar- 
relsome, mischief-making,  Utopian,  or 
clouded  mind.  Ill-luck  is  a  contagious 
disease ;  and  one  unconsciousness  will 
often  infect  another.  But  if  the  misfor- 
tunes be  wholly  unmerited  or  fall  upon 
those  who  are  dear  to  us,  flight  were  un- 
just and  shameful.  In  such  a  case  the  con- 
scious side  of  our  being  —  which  though 
it  know  but  little,  is  yet  able  to  fashion 
truths  of  a  different  order,  truths  that 
might  almost  be  the  first  flowers  of  a 
dawning  world  —  is  bound  to  resist  the  uni- 
versal wisdom  of  unconsciousness,  bound 
325 


The  Buried  Temple 

to  brave  its  warnings  and  involve  it  in  its 
own  ruin,  that  may  well  be  a  victory  upon 
an  ideal  plane  which  some  day  perhaps 
shall  appeal  to  the  unconsciousness  also. 

We  ask  ourselves,  also,  whether  uncon- 
sciousness, which  we  regard  as  the  source 
of  our  luck,  is  really  incapable  of  change 
or  improvement.  Have  we  not  all  of  us 
noticed  how  strange  are  the  ways  of  chance  ? 
When  we  behold  it  active  in  a  small  town, 
or  among  a  certain  number  of  men  within 
the  range  of  our  own  observation,  the 
goddess  would  seem  to  become  as  per- 
sistent as  a  gadfly,  and  no  less  fantastic. 
Her  marked  personality  and  character  will 
vary  in  accordance  with  the  event  or  the 
being  whereon  she  may  fasten.  She  has 
all  kinds  of  eccentricities,  but  pursues  each 
one  logically  to  the  finish.  Her  first 
gesture  will  tell  us  nothing ;  from  her 
second  we  can  predict  all  that  she  means 
to  do.  Protean  divinity  that  no  image 
326 


Luck 

(fould  completely  describe,  here  she  leaps 
suddenly  forth  like  a  fountain  in  the 
^idst  of  a  desert,  to  disappear  after  hav- 
ing given  birth  to  an  ephemeral  oasis ; 
there  she  returns  at  regular  intervals,  col- 
lecting and  scattering,  like  migratory  birds 
that  obey  the  rhythm  of  the  seasons.  On 
our  right  she  fells  a  man  and  concerns 
herself  with  him  no  further;  on  our  left 
she  bears  down  another,  and  furiously 
worries  her  victim.  But  though  she  bring 
favour  or  ruin,  she  will  almost  always  re- 
main astoundingly  faithful  to  the  character 
she  has  once  and  for  all  assumed,  in  every 
particular  case.  This  man,  for  instance, 
who  has  been  unsuccessful  in  war,  will 
continue  to  be  unsuccessful ;  the  other 
will  invariably  win  or  lose  at  the  cards ; 
a  third  will  infallibly  be  deceived  ;  a  fourth 
will  find  water,  fire,  or  the  dangers  of  the 
street,  especially  hostile ;  a  fifth  will  be 
constantly  fortunate  or  unfortunate  in 
327 


The  Buried  Temple 

love,  money  matters,  etc.,  and  so  to  the 
end.  All  this  may  prove  nothing,  but  we 
may  regard  it  at  least  as  some  indication 
that  her  realm  is  truly  within  us,  and  not 
without ;  and  that  a  hidden  force  that  em- 
anates only  from  us  provides  her  with  form 
and  with  vestment. 

Her  habits  at  times  will  suddenly  alter 
one  eccentricity  producing  another ;  some 
brusque  change  of  front  will  give  the  lie 
to  her  character,  to  confirm  it  the  instant 
after  in  a  new  atmosphere.  We  say  then 
that  "  luck  turns."  May  it  not  rather  be 
our  unconsciousness  that  is  gradually  de- 
veloping, at  last  displaying  some  pru- 
dence, attention,  and  slowly  becoming 
aware  that  important  events  are  stirring  in 
the  world  to  which  it  is  attached?  Has 
it  gained  some  experience  ?  Has  a  ray  of 
intelligence,  a  spark  of  will-power,  filtered 
through  to  its  lair  and  hinted  at  danger? 
Does  it  learn,  after  years  have  flown,  and 
328 


Luck 

trial  after  trial  has  had  to  be  borne,  the 
wisdom  of  casting  aside  its  confident 
apathy?  Can  external  disaster  arouse  it 
from  perilous  slumber?  Or,  if  it  always 
has  known  what  was  happening  over  the 
roof  of  its  prison,  is  it  able,  after  long  and 
painful  effort,  at  last,  at  the  critical  mo- 
ment, to  contrive  some  kind  of  crevice  in 
the  great  wall,  built  by  the  indifference  of 
centuries,  that  separates  it  from  its  un- 
known sisters ;  and  does  it  thus  succeed  in 
entering  the  ephemeral  life  on  which  a 
part  of  its  own  life  depends  ? 

But  we  must  admit  that  this  hypothesis 
of  unconsciousness  will  not  suffice  to  ac- 
count for  all  the  injustice  of  chance.  Its 
three  most  iniquitous  acts  are  the  three 
disasters  —  the  most  terrible  of  all  to  which 
man  is  exposed  —  that  habitually  strike 
him  before  birth;  I  refer  to  absolute 
329 


The  Buried  Temple 

poverty,  disease  (especially  in  the  shock- 
ing forms  of  physiological  degradation 
and  incurable  infirmities,  of  repulsive  ugli- 
ness and  deformity),  and  intellectual  weak- 
ness. These  are  the  three  great  priestesses 
of  unrighteousness  that  lie  in  wait  for  in- 
nocence and  brand  it  on  the  threshold  of 
life.  And  yet,  mysterious  as  their  method 
of  choice  may  appear,  the  triple  source 
whence  they  derive  these  three  irremedi- 
able scourges  is  less  mysterious  than  one 
is  inclined  to  believe.  We  need  not  look 
for  it  in  a  pre-established  will,  in  fatal, 
hostile,  eternal,  impenetrable  laws.  Pov- 
erty has  its  origin  in  man's  own  province  ; 
and  though  we  may  marvel  why  one 
should  be  rich,  and  the  other  poor,  we 
are  well  aware  that  the  existence,  side  by 
side,  of  excessive  wealth  and  excessive 
misery,  is  due  to  human  injustice  alone. 
In  this  wickedness  neither  gods  nor  stars 
have  part.  And  as  for  disease  and  mental 
330 


Luck 

weakness,  when  we  shall  have  eliminated 
from  them  what  now  is  due  to  poverty, 
mother  of  most  of  our  mortal  and  physical 
sorrows,  as  well  as  to  the  anterior,  and  by 
no  means,  inevitable,  faults  of  the  parents, 
then,  though  some  measure  of  persistent, 
and  unaccountable,  injustice  may  still  re- 
main, this  relic  of  mystery  will  very  nigh 
go  into  the  hollow  of  the  philosopher's 
hand,  and  there  he  shall,  later,  examine  it 
at  his  leisure.  But  we  of  to-day  shall  be 
wise  in  refusing  to  allow  our  life  to  be 
unnecessarily  darkened,  or  hedged  round 
with  imaginary  maledictions  and  foes. 

As  far  as  ordinary  luck  is  concerned,  we 
shall  do  well  to  believe,  for  the  moment 
that  the  history  of  our  fortune  (which  is  not 
necessarily  the  history  of  our  real  happiness, 
since  this  may  be  wholly  independent  of 
luck) is  the  history  ofour  unconscious  being. 
There  are  more  elements  of  probability  in 
such  a  creed  than  in  the  assumption  that 
331 


The  Buried  Temple 

the  stars,  eternity,  or  the  spirit  of  the 
universe,  are  taking  part  in  our  pretty 
adventures ;  and  it  gives  more  spur  to  our 
courage.  And  this  idea,  even  though  it 
may  possibly  be  as  difficult  to  alter  the 
character  of  our  unconsciousness  as  to 
modify  the  course  of  Mars  or  of  Venus  — 
still  seems  less  distant  and  less  chimerical 
than  the  other ;  and  when  we  have  to  choose 
between  two  probabilities  it  is  our  imper- 
ative duty  to  select  the  one  that  presents 
the  least  obstacles  to  our  hopes.  Further, 
should  misfortune  be  indeed  inevitable, 
there  would  be  I  know  not  what  proud 
consolation  in  being  able  to  tell  ourselves 
that  it  issues  solely  from  us,  and  that  we 
are  not  the  victims  of  a  malign  will  or  the 
toys  and  playthings  of  useless  chance ; 
that  in  suffering  more  than  our  brothers 
we  are  perhaps  only  recording,  in  time  and 
space,  the  necessary  form  of  our  own  per- 
sonality. And  so  long  as  calamity  does 
33^ 


Luck 

not  attack  the  intimate  pride  of  man,  he 
retains  the  force  to  continue  the  struggle 
and  accomplish  his  essential  mission ; 
which  is  to  live  with  all  the  ardour  where- 
of he  is  capable,  and  as  though  his  life 
were  of  greater  consequence  than  any 
other  to  the  destinies  of  mankind. 

This  idea  is  also  more  conformable  to 
the  vast  law  which  restores  to  us,  one  by 
one,  the  gods  wherewith  we  had  filled  the 
world.  Of  these  gods  the  greater  number 
were  merely  the  effect  of  causes  that  re- 
posed in  ourselves.  As  we  progress  we 
shall  discover  that  many  a  force  that 
mastered  us  and  aroused  our  wonder  was 
only  an  ill-understood  fragment  of  our 
own  power  ;  and  this  will  probably  become 
more  apparent  every  day. 

And  though  we  shall  not  have  con- 
quered the  unknown  force  by  bringing  it 
nearer  or  enclosing  it  within  us,  there  yet 
shall  be  gain  in  knowing  where  it  abides 
333 


The  Buried  Temple 

and  where  we  may  question  it.  Obscure 
forces  surround  us ;  but  the  one  that  con- 
cerns us  most  nearly  lies  at  the  very  centre 
of  our  being.  All  the  others  pass  through 
it :  it  is  their  trysting-place :  they  re-enter 
and  congregate  there :  and  only  in  the  de- 
gree of  their  relation  to  it  have  they 
interest  for  us. 

To  distinguish  this  force  from  the  host 
of  others  we  have  called  it  unconscious- 
ness. And  when  we  shall  have  succeeded 
in  studying  this  unconsciousness  more 
closely,  when  its  mysterious  adroitness,  its 
antipathies  and  preferences,  its  helpless- 
ness, shall  be  better  known  to  us,  we  shall 
have  most  strangely  blunted  the  teeth 
and  nails  of  the  monster  who  persecutes 
us  under  the  name  of  Fortune,  Destiny, 
or  Chance.  At  the  present  hour  we  are 
feeding  it  still  as  a  blind  man  might  feed 
the  lion  that  at  the  last  shall  devour  him. 
Soon  perhaps  the  lion  will  be  seen  by  us 
334 


Luck 

in  its  true  light,  and  we  shall  then  learn 
how  to  subdue  him. 

Let  us  therefore  unweariedly  follow 
each  path  that  leads  from  our  conscious- 
ness to  our  unconsciousness.  We  shall 
thus  succeed  in  hewing  some  kind  of  track 
through  the  great  and  as  yet  impassable 
roads  that  lead  from  the  seen  to  the  un- 
seen, from  man  to  God,  from  the  individ- 
ual to  the  universe.  At  the  end  of  these 
roads  lies  hidden  the  general  secret  of  life. 
In  the  meanwhile  let  us  adopt  the  hypoth- 
esis that  offers  the  most  encouragement  to 
our  existence  in  this  life  which  has  need 
of  us  for  the  solution  of  its  own  enigmas ; 
for  we  are  those  in  whom  its  secrets  crys- 
tallise most  limpidly  and  most  rapidly. 


335 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

Santa  Barbara  College  Library 
Goleta,  California 

Return  to  desk  from  which  borrowed. 
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